i!iii!i|lli 


mil 


. 


! 


llll!Mnill!IHIIIIill!ll{l 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


Digitized  by  tine  Internet  Arcliive 

in  2007  witli  funding  from 

IVIicrosoft  Corporation 


littp://www.arcliive.org/details/aimsidealsofreprOOrummiala 


Portrait  by  \Vm.  M.  Chase. 


Aims  and  Ideals 


OF 


Representative   American 
Painters. 

WRITTEN    AND   ARRANGED 
BY 

JOHN  RUMMELL, 
E.  M.  BERLIN. 


E.  M.  BERLIN, 

406  Mooney  Building, 
BUFFALO,  N.  Y. 


Copyright,  1901,  by 
E.  M.  Berlin. 


— BECKTOLD— 

PRINTING  AND  BOOK  MFG.  CO. 
ST.  LOUIS,  MO. 


CONTENTS. 


HA 

310 


I.    Art  and  the  human  need  for  beauty 
II.     Education  necessary  to  the  intelli 
gent  appreciation  of  art,     .     . 

III.  Art  and  Nature, 

IV.  The  Pre-Raphaelite  influence  upon 

American  painters,     .... 
V.     The  Barbizon  influence  introduced 

by  William  M.  Hunt,     .     .     . 
VI.     The  Genius  of  Wyant,     .     .     . 
VII.     Inness,  the  virile  and  versatile  inter- 
preter of  the  American  landscape 
VIII.     The  originality  of  Whistler,  .     . 
IX.     Whistler's  theory  of  art  as  exempli 
fled     in     his     "arrangements,' 
"harmonies,"  and  "nocturnes,' 
X.     Whistler  as  a  portrait  painter,    . 
XI.     Sargent :  his  fortunate  career  and 

brilliant  achievements,  .     .     . 

XII.     Edwin  Lord  Weeks,  an  American 

interpreter  of  Oriental  subjects 

XIII.  An   American   painter    of    French 

peasants 

XIV.  The  idealism  of  Ridgway  Knight, 

7 


PAGE. 

15 

19 
21 

27 

28 
33 

36 
44 


48 
58 

64 

73 

78 
81 


2224235 


PAGE. 

XV.    An  American  painter  of  Dutch  sub- 
jects,     83 

XVI.     William  M.  Chase,  the  master  tech- 

nicist, 86 

XVII.     John  La  Farge,  the  American  col- 

orist, 95 

XVIII.     The  great  American  genre  painter, 

Winslow  Homer, 106 

XIX.     Marine,  animal,   figure  and  land- 
scape painters, 110 

XX.     Conclusion 113 


INDEX  TO  PAINTERS. 


PAGE. 

Abbey,  Edwin  A., Ill 

Beaux,  Cecilia 112 

Chase,  William  M., 86 

Copley,  John  Singleton, 113 

Crane,  Bruce, 35 

Dannat,  W.  T., Ill 

Davis,  Charles  H., 112 

De  Haas,  M.  F.  H.,       .       .       .       ,       .       .  110 

Dewey,  Charles  Melville, 112 

Giflford,  R.  Swain, Ill 

Harrison,  Alexander, 110 

Hitchcock,  George, Ill 

Homer,  Winslow, 106 

Hunt,  William  Morris 28 

Inne^s,  George 36 

Inness,  George,  Jr., Ill 

Knight,  D.  Ridgway, 81 

La  Farge,  John, 95 

McChesney,  Clara, 112 

Mcllhenny,  C.  Morgan, Ill 

Melchers,  J.  Gari, 83 

Millet,  F.  D., Ill 

Moran,  Edward, 110 

9 


PAGE. 

Moran,  Peter Ill 

Moran,  Thomas, 112 

Hosier,  Henry Ill 

Murphy,  J.  Francis 112 

Nicholls,  Rhoda  Holmes, 112 

Pearce,  Charles  Sprague, 78 

Richards,  W.  T 110 

Sargent,  John  Singer, 64 

Shannon,  J.  J "  .  Ill 

Sherwood,  Rosina, 112 

Stuart,  Gilbert, 113 

Tryon,  D.  W., Ill 

Vedder,  Elihu Ill 

Weeks,  Edwin  Lord, 73 

Whistler,  James  McNeill, 44 

Wiggins,  Carleton, Ill 

Wyant,  Alexander  H., 33 


10 


INTRODUCTION 


HB  constantly  growing 
interest  in  American  art 
lias  been  thouglit  a  suf- 
ficient reason  for  publishing  the 
present  essay  on  the  subject.  The 
purpose  here,  however,  has  not 
been  to  chronicle  the  lives  and 
works  of  our  American  painters, 
but  rather  to  explain  briefly  the 
philosophy  of  art  in  general  and 
the  peculiar  province  of  painting 
as  a  medium  for  aesthetic  enjoy- 
ment,   in   order   thereby   to   prepare 

the  way  for  a  clearer  understanding 
11 


of  the  aims  and  theories  of  our 
leading  American  painters,  and  to 
make  possible  a  fairly  correct  ap- 
preciation of  their  originality,  their 
high  ideals  and  their  successful 
achievements.  Special  considera- 
tion has  been  given  to  William 
Morris  Hunt,  who  brought  the 
Barbizon  influence  to  America ;  to 
James  McNeill  Whistler,  the  truest 
apostle  of  "art  for  art's  sake";  to 
George  Inness,  the  virile  and  versa- 
tile interpreter  of  the  American 
landscape ;  to  John  La  Farge,  the 
preeminent  American  colorist ;  to 
William  M.  Chase,  the  master 
technicist ;  and  to  Winslow  Ho- 
mer, the  most  American  of   all   our 


painters.  Somewliat  briefer  treat- 
ment has  been  given  to  other  dis- 
tinguished artists,  and  the  essay 
concludes  with  an  estimate  of 
America's  place  in  the  world  of 
art  to-day  and  its  prospective  rank 
in  the  future. 

E.  M.  BKRI.IN. 


13 


Portrait  by  Cecilia  Beaux. 


I. 

ESS  than  a  score  of  years  ago  »rt  and  th«  human 
Matthew  Arnold  criticised  ""  "'*  *"  ^' 
our  American  life  as  being 
uninteresting.  The  polit- 
ical and  social  problems  in  our  country, 
he  said,  we  have  successfully  solved  — 
for  our  political  system  works  smoothly 
and  our  social  system  is  quite  free  from 
troublesome  class  distinctions.  But 
the  human  problem  we  have  not  solved. 
We  have  not  as  yet  so  shaped  our  life 
and  our  institutions  as  to  satisfy  the 
human  need  for  beauty.  Our  cities 
and  towns  are  for  the  most  part  unat- 
tractive, even  their  names  being  gener- 
ally inappropriate  or  ugly.  Our  artists 
prefer  to  live  in  Europe.  While  trav- 
ehng  in  this  country,  Mr.  Arnold  met 
a  German  portrait  painter,  who  was 
thriving  here,  and  asked  him  how  he 
liked  America.  The  German  replied, 
"  How  can  an  artist  like  it  ?  " 
IS 


Now,  whatever  may  be  thought  of 
Mr.  Arnold's  criticism,  whether  or  not 
it  is -true  that  as  a  nation  we  are  not 
distinguished  for  any  strong  sense  of 
the  beautiful,  it  is  yet  equally  true  that 
there  have  arisen  among  us  during  the 
last  century  many  individuals  possessed 
of  the  most  passionate  love  of  beauty, 
and  the  genius  to  give  it  an  original 
form  of  expression.  American  painters 
and  sculptors  have  for  years  been  famous 
in  Europe,  where  art  is  best  understood 
and  most  appreciated.  That  their  own 
countrymen  have  honored  them  less 
points,  no  doubt,  to  an  imperfectly 
developed  state  of  the  artistic  sense  of 
the  majority  of  the  American  people, 
and  would  seem  to  justify  the  charge 
made  against  us  by  our  English  critic. 
On  the  other  hand,  there  are  intelligent 
Americans  who  affect  to  speak  slight- 
ingly of  our  native  artists,  and  seem  to 
think  that  our  painters  have  produced, 
as  yet,  very  little  that  is  original  or 
important.     A  better  understanding  of 

i6 


art  in  general  and  a  fuller  knowledge  of* 
the  achievements  of  our  American  art- 
ists would  dispel  any  such  opinion. 
Happily  there  is  now  an  awakening  in 
America  to  the  need  of  a  better  acquaint- 
ance with  art.  We  are  learning  to 
recognize  the  dignified  and  significant 
place  that  art  must  always  hold  in  the 
life  of  a  truly  civilized  people.  The 
love  of  art  is  the  love  of  beauty,  and 
the  love  of  beauty  is  the  love  of  per- 
fection. Whoever,  therefore,  inculcates 
the  love  of  art  inculcates  also  that  love 
of  perfection  which  insures  the  steady 
advancement  and  uplifting  of  the 
human  race. 

As  a  nation  we  are  fortunate,  there- 
fore, to  have  already  so  much  that  is 
valuable  in  our  own  art  with  which  to 
educate  our  aesthetic  tastes  and  refine 
our  artistic  judgment.  It  is  our  duty, 
too,  to  know  more  about  what  our  own 
artists  have  done  and  are  doing.  It  is 
only  when  the  interest  in  art  has  be- 
come general  and  the  enthusiasm  strong 
17 


that  there  is  created  an  atmosphere  in 
which  artists  can  thrive  and  exert  their 
beneficent  influence  on  the  communitv* 
in  which  they  Hve. 


i8 


II. 

HE  term  "art,"  in  its  broad-  education 

,      J  .        necessary  to  the 

est      sense,    includes     music,    intelligent  appre- 

eloquence,  poetry,  painting,  "atton  of  art. 

sculpture  and  architecture. 
In  our  language.it  often  has  a  restricted 
application  to  painting  alone.  No 
branch  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  race  has  as 
yet  achieved  anything  very  considerable 
in  the  art  of  music.  What  our  branch 
of  the  race  has  done  in  poetry  and 
oratory  every  intelligent  American 
knows.  But  not  every  American 
knows  what  our  artists  have  produced 
in  painting,  sculpture  and  architecture. 
We  have  sculptors  and  architects  of 
genius,  but  it  is  in  painting  that  Amer- 
ican artistic  genius  has  attained  by  far  the 
greatest  success.  In  this  essay  we  shall 
confine  ourselves  to  the  study  of  Ameri- 
can painters,  their  aims  and  their  works. 
Fully  to  appreciate  any  form  of  art, 
whether  it  be  music,  poetry,  painting, 
19 


sculpture  or  architecture,  it  is  necessary 
to  have  at  least  a  clear  knowledge  of 
the  fundamental  principles  that  underlie 
all  the  arts,  if  not  also  a  certain  degree 
of  technical  training.  The  vast  general 
public,  whose  perception  of  beauty  has 
received  little  or  no  education  whatever, 
fails  utterly  to  understand  the  truly 
great  artist,  and  delights  chiefly  in  that 
which  is  meretricious  and  commonplace 
and  vulgar.  How  often  do  we  hear 
people  say,  "  I  don't  know  anything 
about  painting,  but  I  know  what  I 
like."  Then,  after  having  disqualified 
themselves  as  critics  by  this  confession 
they  proceed  arrogantly  to  pick  flaws  in 
the  work  of  some  great  master,  or  offer 
wholly  inconsequential  reasons  for  ad- 
miring the  superficial  and  conventional 
effort  of  a  mere  shallow  painter-man. 
Only  a  fair  amount  of  instruction  in 
the  theory  of  art  would  often  convert 
such  arrogance  into  admiring  humility 
and  such  foolish  admiration  into  intelli- 
gent distrust. 


Ill 

T     is     a     common     conception    Hrt  and  r^ature. 

that  as  art  is  an  imitation  of 
Nature,  the  more  perfect  the 
imitation  the  more  perfect 
the  art.  Let  us  pause  for  a  moment  to 
consider  this  proposition,  to  see  if  it  be 
true,  and  if  not  true,  let  us  inquire  what 
the  purpose  of  art  really  is ;  it  will 
help  us  the  better  to  understand  the 
aims  and  excellencies  of  the  artists  of 
whom  we  are  about  to  speak. 

It  cannot  be  denied  that  it  is  the  busi- 
ness of  the  artist  to  imitate  Nature.  If 
he  does  not  study  Nature  faithfully,  and 
keep  in  close  touch  with  her,  he  is  sure 
to  fall  into  gross  exaggerations,  eccen- 
tricities and  mannerisms.  The  history 
of  art  shows  plainly  that  whenever  art- 
ists no  longer  take  their  inspiration  from 
Nature,  their  art  begins  to  decline.  It 
is  the  besetting  danger  of  the  artist  that, 
as  he  becomes  master  of  the  technique 


of  his  art,  he  may  formulate  a  fixed 
method  of  doing  his  work,  and  fall 
into  a  habit  of  imitating  his  own  early 
successes ;  and,  as  the  imitation  is  less 
perfect  than  the  thing  imitated,  his  art 
becomes  stereotyped,  mannered  and 
Hfeless.  Michael  Angelo  himself,  in 
his  old  age,  fell  into  this  error 

But  if  the  artist's  only  safety  lies  in 
copying  Nature,  are  we  to  conclude, 
therefore,  that  exact  imitation  is  the 
method  whereby  he  attains  the  best 
results  ?  If  so,  we  might  also  conclude 
that  the  artist's  occupation  would  soon 
be  gone,  for  it  is  said  to  be  possible  now 
to  photograph  not  only  the  forms  in 
Nature  but  the  color  as  well.  We 
know,  however,  that  a  broad  sketch 
executed  by  some  master  is  a  hundred 
times  more  precious  and  more  power- 
ful than  any  photograph  can  ever  be. 
That  exact  imitation  is  not  the  true 
end  of  art  is  proved,  also,  by  the  fact 
that  many  forms  of  art  are  purposely  in- 
exact.   In  sculpture,  that  seeks  to  repro- 


duce  the  likeness  of  men  and  women, 
one  of  the  great  charms  of  the  work 
is  that  there  is  no  attempt  to  reproduce 
color.  The  purity  of  the  white  marble 
or  the  rich  tone  of  the  bronze  lends  a 
dignity  and  a  chasteness  that  would  be 
utterly  destroyed  by  any  attempt  to 
color  the  statue  in  imitation  of  the 
model.  The  advantage  of  the  drama, 
which  is  the  highest,  or  at  least  one  of 
the  highest,  forms  of  poetic  art,  is  that 
instead  of  making  the  characters  speak 
in  ordinary  prose,  it  can  give  them  the 
less  natural  but  more  exalted  form  of 
speech  called  verse.  The  deviation 
from  exact  imitation  in  this  art  is  the 
source  of  one  of  its  chief  beauties. 
But  in  the  graphic  arts  themselves  we 
have  abundant  proof  that  exact  imitation 
is  neither  necessary  nor  desirable. 
Meissonier  painted  with  wonderful 
minuteness  and  extreme  attention  to 
detail,  but  seldom  attempted  to  repro- 
duce the  exact  size  of  any  figure  or 
object.  In  a  pencil  or  charcoal  drawing, 
23 


the  artist  not  only  commonly  reduces 
the  size  of  his  model  but  inevitably  has 
to  forego  the  element  of  color,  yet  a 
broad  pencil  or  charcoal  sketch  may  be  in 
every  sense  highly  artistic  and  effective. 

But  since  it  is  necessary  to  imitate 
something,  to  what  must  the  imitation 
be  applied  ?  To  the  relationships  of 
the  different  parts  of  the  model.  If, 
for  example,  the  subject  be  that  of  a 
man  in  violent  action,  the  artist, 
although  he  may  reduce  the  magnitude 
of  the  figure,  will  keep  the  body  in 
right  proportion  to  the  size  of  the  head, 
the  limbs  in  right  proportion  to  the 
head  and  body,  and  so  throughout  the 
entire  drawing,  keeping  each  part  in 
proportion  to  the  whole.  He  will  also 
reproduce  the  proportionate  angles  at 
which  the  various  limbs  are  set,  thus 
imitating  not  only  the  form  but  the 
attitude  of  the  figure  as  well. 

But  to  produce  the  truest  kind  of 
art,  this  method  of  procedure  must  be 
somewhat  modified.  It  is  the  function 
24 


of  art  to  say  something  more  perfectly 
or  more  beautifully  than  Nature  herself 
says  it.  If,  for  instance,  the  subject  be 
that  of  a  man  in  violent  action  pro- 
voked by  anger,  the  artist  will  select 
those  features  which  especially  express 
anger,  and  exaggerate,  or,  at  least, 
emphasize,  them  and  their  characteristic 
attitudes  in  such  a  manner  as  to  inten- 
sify the  expression  of  that  emotion. 
If  the  artist  be  a  landscape-painter,  he 
will,  of  course,  seek  his  inspiration  out- 
of-doors  in  the  presence  of  Nature.  It 
seldom  happens,  however,  that  Nature 
presents  any  scene  in  which  there  is 
such  a  state  of  harmony  as  is  required 
in  a  picture.  Let  us  suppose,  however, 
that  the  landscape  before  him  is  especi- 
ally expressive  of  repose.  As  he 
sketches,  he  will  give  particular  promi- 
nence to  the  lines  and  objects  that  sug- 
gest repose,  and  either  subordinate,  or 
sacrifice,  or  omit  entirely  all  lines  and 
objects  whose  presence  tends  to  weaken 
or  destroy  the  reposeful  effect.  Often 
25 


a  landscape  is  full  of  what  artists  call 
"  good  sketching  material "  without 
having  anywhere  the  character  of  a  pic- 
ture. There  may  be  beautiful  rocks, 
noble  trees,  richly-colored  fields,  pic- 
turesque cottages,  streams  of  water,  and 
other  interesting  objects,  but  all  so  dis- 
posed that  from  almost  no  point  of  view 
a  good  pictorial  composition  can  be 
made  by  literal  imitation.  The  artist 
then  simply  paints  the  character  of  the 
place,  introducing  such  lines,  such  ob- 
jects, and  such  color  effects  as  are  sug- 
gestive of  the  spot  where  he  is  sketch- 
ing. In  other  words,  he  employs  the 
principle  of  selection,  looking  for  those 
things  that  are  essential  to  the  expression 
of  the  character  of  what  he  is  seeking 
to  represent,  and  omitting  those  that 
are  merely  accidental 


26 


IV. 

T  is  precisely  this  matter  of  cb«pre- 
artistic  selection  that  most  e*!i^ru*pirHrrt 
people  fail  to  understand,  "n  painters. 
No  doubt  the  eloquent,  but 
oftentimes  erroneous,  teaching  of  John 
Ruskin  in  regard  to  the  study  of  Nature 
has  misled  both  artists  and  laymen.  It 
is  certain  that  in  France  it  was  more 
generally  understood  that  it  is  the  func- 
tion of  the  artist  to  interpret  Nature, 
not,  as  was  a  long  time  thought  in 
England,  to  make  a  literal  copy  of  her. 
During  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth 
century  many  of  our  American  painters 
were  strongly  influenced  by  the  Pre- 
Raphaelite  movement  in  England,  and, 
like  the  Pre-Raphaelites,  made  the  least 
possible  use  of  the  principle  of  selec- 
tion, and  painted  Nature  with  literal 
fidelity  to  detail,  overlooking  the  fact 
that  the  peculiar  effect  of  Nature  resides 
in  the  whole  and  not  in  the  parts. 
27 


V. 


Cbc  Barbizon 
influence  intro- 
duced by  QJilHam 
N.  Bunt. 


r  was  a  fortunate  day  for 
American  art,  therefore, 
when  the  influence  of  the 
great  French  painters,  who 
interpreted  Nature  more  broadly  and 
more  rationally,  was  brought  to  our 
shores  by  one  of  the  greatest  of  our 
native  artists,  William  Morris  Hunt. 
Born  at  Brattleboro,  Vermont,  on  the 
31st  of  March,  1824,  Hunt  became  a 
student  at  Harvard  College  at  the  age  of 
sixteen.  At  the  age  of  twenty-two  he 
began  to  study  sculpture  in  Diisseldorf, 
where  he  remained  nine  months.  At  the 
end  of  that  time  he  decided  to  give  up 
sculpture  and  devote  himself  to  paint- 
ing. He  accordingly  went  to  Paris, 
and  entered  Couture's  studio.  Cou- 
ture's  method  of  instruction,  however, 
was  not  the  kind  that  would  enable  a 
pupil  to  develop  a  style  of  his  own,  nor 
did  Hunt  find  the  atmosphere  of  Cou- 
28 


ture's  atelier  altogether  congenial.  He 
v/ent  to  Barbizon,  in  the  Forest  of 
Fontainebleauj  and  became  the  reverent 
disciple  and  intimate  friend  of  Jean 
Fran9ois  Millet.  To  him  he  owed 
his  greatest  inspiration,  though  he  was 
in  no  sense  a  mere  imitator  of  his 
master. 

Hunt  was  one  of  the  first  men  to 
recognize  the  high  order  of  Millet's 
art.  Long  before  France  herself  had 
acknowledged  his  greatness,  Hunt  was 
buying  some  of  his  pictures,  and  finding 
purchasers  for  others.  It  was  largely 
through  his  efforts,  also,  that  America 
was  the  first  country  to  appreciate  and 
patronize  the  great  painter  of  French 
peasants.  To  have  had  the  rare  insight 
to  discern  artistic  genius  where  an  artis- 
tic nation  had  denied  its  existence  or,  at 
least,  neglected  it,  and  to  have  known 
how  to  inspire  others  with  an  enthusias- 
tic admiration  for  that  genius,  were 
unmistakable  signs  that  Hunt  himself 
was  born  to  become  a  leader  in  the 
29 


world  of  art.  After  a  ten  years*  sojourn 
in  Europe  he  returned  to  his  native 
country,  and  in  1855  opened  an  art 
school  in  Boston  and  introduced  the 
Barbizon  methods  of  painting  in  Amer- 
ica. Being  possessed  of  a  charming 
personality  and  a  remarkable  gift  of  im- 
parting his  ideas  to  others,  he  soon 
became  the  admired  master  of  a  large 
number  of  disciples,  over  whom  he 
exerted  a  powerful  influence. 

As  an  artist,  Hunt  was  a  man  of 
great  versatility  and  power.  He  painted 
landscapes,  portraits,  genre  subjects,  and 
subjects  purely  ideal.  He  was  also  a 
mural  decorator,  his  most  noted  work 
being  the  allegorical  subjects,  "  The 
Flight  of  Night"  and  "The  Discov- 
erer," on  the  walls  of  the  State  Capitol 
at  Albany,  N.  Y.  Among  his  well- 
known  pictures  are  "  The  Bugle-call," 
"  The  Drummer  Boy,"  and  "  The 
Bathers." 

Hunt  did  not  believe,  as  some  peo- 
ple in  this  country  do,  that  American 
30 


artists  ought  to  forego  the  advantages 
of  European  study,  lest  they  become 
imitators  of  the  French  or  the  Ger- 
mans. He  knew  that  the  great  genius 
in  any  form  of  art  always  owes  much  to 
the  work  of  his  predecessors,  and  that 
it  is  by  first  assimilating  all  that  others 
have  discovered  and  learned  that  an 
original  mind  becomes  best  equipped 
to  develop  a  new  mode  of  expression 
or  to  give  utterance  to  a  new  concep- 
tion of  life  or  of  art.  He  knew  that 
to  condemn  the  American  artist  to  the 
futile  task  of  rediscovering  for  himself 
the  art  principles,  and  the  methods  of 
work  gradually  evolved  by  European 
artists  in  the  course  of  several  centu- 
ries would  merely  delay  the  progress 
of  art  in  this  country.  He  knew, 
too,  that  the  young  artist  who  has  a 
strong  individuality  and  who  really  has 
something  to  say  to  the  world,  cannot 
help  saying  it  in  his  own  way,  and  that 
his  way  of  saying  it  will  be  all  the  more 
forceful  because  of  the  perfect  mastery 
31 


of  the  technique  of  his  art.  He  there- 
fore counseled  the  most  thorough 
study  and  the  broadest  possible  culture 
as  the  best  foundation  upon  which  to 
build  original  work.  Hunt  died  in 
1879.  Since  his  death,  our  native 
artists,  who  formerly  went  to  Germany 
or  to  Rome,  have,  like  him,  sought  their 
education  for  the  most  part  in  France, 
where  the  art-impulse  to-day  is  stronger 
and  the  advantages  for  art-study  better 
than  in  any  other  country. 


32 


VI. 

HAT  a  truly  original  mind  cbe  eentua  of 
will  find  out  its  own  method  ^^*"** 
of  expression,  and  know 
how  to  profit  by  the  study 
of  other  artists  without  imitating  them, 
is  shown  in  the  case  of  Alexander 
H.  Wyant,  one  of  our  best  landscape- 
painters.  Wyant  was  born  in  1839  at 
Port  Washington,  Ohio.  His  first 
occupation  was  that  of  a  sign-painter  in 
his  native  village.  He  went  to  Cincin- 
nati and  painted  some  pictures  which 
pleased  the  art  patrons  of  that  city  and 
brought  him  enough  money  to  enable 
him  to  go  to  Europe.  He  studied  at 
Diisseldorf  for  some  years  under  Hans 
Gude,  and  afterwards  went  to  London, 
where  he  studied  the  works  of  Turner 
and  Constable.  He  returned  to 
America  and  settled  in  New  York. 
Although  his  special  training  as  an 
artist     was    received     at     Diisseldorf, 

33 


nothing  could  be  further  from  the 
Dusseldorfian  method  of  painting  than 
Wyant's.  His  style  was  distinctly  his 
own,  the  outgrowth  of  a  strong  indi- 
viduality and  an  earnest  and  sincere 
study  of  Nature. 

After  examining  a  number  of  his 
pictures,  you  are  especially  struck  with 
Wyant's  manner  of  treating  the  light. 
In  one  picture  you  will  look  through  a 
dark  wood  at  a  patch  of  sky  in  the 
middle  filled  with  luminous  white 
clouds  of  almost  dazzling  brilliancy. 
In  another,  your  eye  travels  up  a  road 
passing  along  the  edge  of  a  forest  and 
meets  a  luminous  sky  at  the  distant 
horizon.  In  still  another,  the  sky  is 
filled  with  storm-clouds  all  dark  and 
threatening,  except  in  one  spot  which 
glows  white  with  a  last  gleam  of  the 
already  hidden  sun.  Again,  instead  of 
this  concentration,  there  is  a  remarkable 
diffusion  of  light  throughout  the  entire 
picture.  And  yet  Wyant  was  not  a 
chiaroscurist,    getting    his     effects    by 

34 


violent  contrasts.  On  the  contrary,  he 
was  an  excellent  colorist,  capable  of  the 
most  delicate  as  well  as  the  most  power- 
ful effects.  Many  of  his  landscapes 
are  truly  idyllic  in  character  and  full  of 
tender  and  poetic  sentiment.  Others 
are  beautiful  interpretations  of  the  more 
dramatic  moods  of  Nature,  or  repre- 
sentations of  the  wild  and  rugged 
scenery  of  the  Adirondacks.  In  all, 
even  in  his  ideal  compositions,  there  is 
great  truth  to  Nature  without  the 
slightest  suggestion  of  vulgar  realism. 
Wyant  worked  both  in  water-color 
and  in  oil,  and  was  a  member  of  the 
National  Academy  of  Design,  and  one 
of  the  first  members  of  the  American 
Water-Color  Society.  He  died  in 
1892.  One  of  his  most  distinguished 
pupils  is  Bruce  Crane,  who  has  been 
very  fitly  called  "  a  poet  in  landscape," 
and  who  at  the  early  age  of  twenty  had 
already  attained  a  national  reputation. 


35 


scape. 


VII. 

inncss,  the  virile   [||       -^iijHE      great     master     among 

and  versatile  l^H  j^W  a  •  i        j  • 

interpreter  of  the    PO  1^       American  land scape-pamters 

Hmerican  land-         [^  ^         WaS  the  late  GeORGE  InNESS. 

To  study  his  career  as  an 
artist  is  to  note  the  successive  steps  in 
the  growth  of  an  extraordinary  and 
original  mind.  Many  artists,  having 
learned  the  technics  of  their  art  from 
some  master,  are  content  forever  after- 
wards to  paint  in  his  manner.  Others, 
again,  develop  a  style  of  their  own,  by 
which  they  allow  themselves  to  be 
mastered  in  turn  and  from  which  they 
never  again  deviate.  Inn'ess,  on  the 
contrary,  not  only  owed  his  art-educa- 
tion almost  entirely  to  himself,  but,  not 
satisfied  with  what  he  had  yet  attained, 
never  relaxed  his  inquiries  into  the 
mysteries  of  his  craft  and  made  con- 
stant progress  to  the  end  of  his  career. 
Born  at  Newburg,  N.  Y.,  May  i, 
1825,  he  took  his  first  draVving  lesson 
36 


at  the  age  of  fourteen.  About  two 
years  later  he  was  placed  in  a  store  in 
Newark,  N.  J.,  but  he  had  no  aptitude 
for  commercial  life,  and  in  a  month  he 
had  driven  all  the  customers  away. 
He  was  next  employed  by  a  firm  of 
map-engravers  in  New  York,  where  he 
remained  for  one  year.  His  health  was 
always  delicate,  and  the  confinement 
here  was  more  than  he  could  endure. 
Returning  to  Newark,  he  began  to 
make  sketches  from  Nature  and  thus 
discovered  his  true  vocation.  He  was 
now  about  eighteen  years  of  age.  He 
studied  painting  for  a  few  months 
under  Gignoux  in  New  York,  the  only 
regular  instruction  he  ever  received,  and 
then  opened  a  studio  of  his  own.  He 
had  the  good  fortune  to  sell  many  of 
his  pictures,  and  to  win  the  warm 
friendship  of  a  wealthy  gentleman, 
who  offered  to  send  him  to  Europe. 
He  went  to  Rome  and  spent  some 
fifteen  months  in  Italy.  About  a  year 
and  a  half  later,  at  the  age  of  twenty-. 
37 


five,  he  went  to  Europe  again,  and 
remained  in  France  for  a  year. 
Returning  to  his  native  country,  he 
began  his  long  series  of  interpretations 
of  the  American  landscape,  no  less 
remarkable  for  the  great  range  of 
sympathy  which  they  reveal  with 
Nature's  various  moods  than  for  the 
power  and  thoroughly  individual  style 
of  their  execution. 

Notwithstanding  his  always  delicate 
health,  Inness  was  a  prodigious  worker. 
At  the  beginning  of  his  career,  when 
sketching  out-of-doors,  he  used  to  draw 
every  stick  and  stone  in  the  landscape 
before  him.  By  this  means  he  acquired 
a  most  intimate  knowledge  of  all  the  . 
forms  in  Nature,  the  peculiar  structure 
of  every  kind  of  tree  and  shrub,  of 
every  flower  and  weed,  of  every  rock 
and  boulder.  In  his  early  paintings, 
which  are  frequently  large  and  almost 
panoramic  in  character,  the  effect  of 
this  kind  of  study  was  an  undue 
attempt  to  delineate  every  detail  of 
38 


grass  and  foliage,  although  his  pictures 
were  always  perfect  in  tone  and  excel- 
lent in  composition.  As  he  advanced 
in  his  work,  he  developed  in  a  fuller 
degree  the  art  of  selection,  and  grad- 
ually sacrificed  many  of  the  lesser 
truths  of  Nature  in  order  more  pow- 
erfully to  represent  the  larger  ones. 
The  result  was  a  greater  breadth  and 
*  simplicity  of  effect  and  a  more  direct 
appeal  to  the  emotions  of  the  spec- 
tator. 

In  Inness's  work  we  find  an  interpre- 
tation of  every  one  of  Nature's  moods, 
of  every  season  of  the  year,  of  every 
hour  in  the  day.  Bright  days,  gray 
days,  lowering  days,  days  of  storm  and 
tempest ;  the  first  days  of  spring,  with 
her  tender  young  shoots  and  delicate 
lace-like  foliage ;  June,  with  her  thick- 
leaved  woods  and  her  flowery  meadows ; 
full-grown  summer,  in  all  her  many 
glories ;  ripe  autumn,  with  her  mellow 
harvest,  and  her  abundance  of  red  and 
scarlet  and  yellow   and  gold;    naked 

39 


winter  woods  and  snow-clad  fields  and 
ice-bound  streams ;  the  tender  light  of 
the  early  morning  hours,  the  midday 
glare,  the  warm  glow  of  summer  after- 
noons, the  splendors  of  the  sunset,  gray 
twilight,  mellow  moonlight,  sober  night 
—  all  have  found  their  sympathetic  in- 
terpreter in  the  great  poet-painter  In- 
ness,  who  had  the  gift  to  see  beauty 
not  only  in  the  stately  forests  and 
sweeping  meadows  but  in  the  humble 
American  village  and  the  prosaic  man- 
ufacturing town  as  well.  Possessing  a 
rich  and  exalted  imagination,  he  knew 
how  to  reconcile  ugly  factory  buildings, 
smoky  chimneys,  and  the  modern 
utilitarian  locomotive  with  the  poetic 
beauties  of  an  American  landscape  and 
an  American  sunset.  During  his  sev- 
eral visits  to  Europe  he  painted  the 
romantic  scenes  of  Italy  and  France ; 
but  his  greatest  glory  is  that  he  painted 
the  American  landscape  in  a  truly 
American  spirit.  He  has  oftentimes 
been  compared  with  the  French  painters 
40 


of  the  Fontainebleau-Barbizon  school ; 
but,  though  he  doubtless  learned  much 
by  studying  their  pictures,  his  style  . 
is  entirely  his  own.  He  excelled  Dau- 
bigny  in  the  range  of  his  subjects,  and 
was  a  better  draughtsman  than  he.  He 
painted  sunsets  with  as  great  a  power  as 
Corot  and  excelled  him  in  the  painting 
of  trees.  If  he  did  not  paint  animals 
with  all  the  power  of  Troyon,  it  was 
because  he  generally  used  cows  and 
sheep  and  domestic  fowls  in  his  land- 
scapes as  accessories  merely.  As  a 
landscapist  he  is  the  superior  of  Troyon, 
whose  painting  of  the  sky  is  often 
sadly  out  of  tone.  He  interpreted  the 
American  oaks  and  pines  and  birches  in 
a  style  as  truly  personal  and  distinct  as 
that  of  Theodore  Rousseau.  If  he 
has  not  so  much  emotional  power  as 
Millet,  it  is  because  he  was  first  of  all  a 
painter,  while  Millet  was  less  a  painter 
than  a  poet. 

Inness  was  not  only  a  hard  worker, 
painting  sometimes  as  much  as  fifteen 
41 


hours  a  day,  but  he  also  worked  with 
great  rapidity  and  often  produced  a 
masterpiece  in  a  few  hours.  He  was 
likely,  however,  to  change  a  picture  at 
any  time,  as  new  inspiration  came  to 
him,  and  he  commonly  had  a  number 
of  pictures  in  progress,  turning  from 
one  to  the  other  as  his  emotion  changed 
or  the  difficulties  he  encountered  made 
him  uncertain  of  how  he  ought  to  pro- 
ceed. He  allowed  his  emotions  often- 
times to  govern  him  so  completely  that 
what  he  started  out  to  paint  would  have 
been  utterly  unlike  the  picture  he  did 
paint  before  he  finished.  When  work- 
ing in  his  studio,  he  would  perhaps  be- 
gin the  day  by  composing  a  picture 
representing  a  spring  morning;  by  noon 
it  would  perhaps  have  been  converted 
into  an  autumn  scene,  and  before  night 
into  a  winter  evening.  He  was  a  man 
of  so  many  ideas  that  he  was  not  con- 
tent to  work  forever  in  one  color 
scheme  nor  forever  on  the  same  subject. 
He  never  painted  in  any  medium  but 
42 


oil,  but  he  experimented  constantly,  and 
if  his  work  was  not  always  of  even 
excellence,  it  was  at  least  endlessly  varied 
and  interesting.  He  died  in  Scotland 
in  the  summer  of  1894.  Few  painters 
have  thought  more  deeply  on  art 
than  he,  or  illustrated  their  theories 
more  successfully.  He  has  exerted  a 
strong  influence  on  the  present  gener- 
ation of  American  landscape-painters, 
who,  without  imitating  him  directly, 
have  acquired  much  of  his  virility  and 
his  breadth  of  vision. 


43 


Che  origtnaHt7>  of 
OThiatUr. 


VIII. 

F  the  painters  living  to-day 
perhaps  none  other  has 
caused  so  great  a  stir  in  the 
art  world  or  provoked  so 
much  discussion  of  art  principles  as 
James  McNeill  Whistler.  Not 
only  as  a  painter  in  oil,  in  water-color 
and  in  pastel,  but  also  as  an  etcher  and 
a  master  of  the  lithograph,  he  has  pro- 
duced work  of  such  striking  original- 
ity that  critics  and  artists  alike  have 
failed  to  understand  and  been  puzzled 
to  know  how  to  classify  him,  and  he 
was  at  first  as  much  condemned  as  he 
has  since  been  admired  and  praised. 
Twenty  years  ago,  John  Ruskin,  criti- 
cising one  of  Whistler's  pictures,  de- 
clared it  to  be  equivalent  to  flinging  a 
"  pot  of  paint "  in  the  public's  face, 
and  was  thereupon  sued  by  the  artist, 
who  complained  that  the  criticism  had 
damaged  his  reputation  and  injured  his 

44 


business.  The  verdict  was  in  favor  of 
the  plaintiff,  although  the  amount  of 
the  damages  awarded  him  was  only  one 
farthing;  but  during  the  trial  no  less 
an  artist  than  Edward  Burne-Jones  was 
called  in  to  pass  his  judgment  upon  the 
picture  in  question.  He  admitted  that 
it  was  beautiful  in  color,  but  pronounced 
it  utterly  lacking  in  finish,  and  hence  in 
no  true  sense  a  work  of  art.  This  in- 
teresting controversy  is  now  a  matter  of 
history,  and  Whistler's  own  account  of 
it  is  given  in  that  unique  book  of  his 
called  "The  Gentle  Art  of  Making 
Enemies."  To-day  it  is  not  difficult 
to  find,  even  in  the  writings  of  English 
critics,  expressions  of  amazement  that 
there  could  have  been  enough  stupidity 
to  deny  the  superexcellent  beauty  of 
the  picture  which  so  excited  the  indig- 
nation of  John  Ruskin  and  the  con- 
tempt of  Burne-Jones.  Mr.  Whist- 
ler's genius  has  at  last  triumphed  over 
the  severest  critics  even  in  England,  and, 
having  won  the  fullest  recognition  for 

45 


his  art  in  that  country,  he  left  London 
a  few  years  since  and  moved  his  studio 
to  Paris. 

Born  at  Lowell,  Mass.,  in  1834,  the 
son  of  a  famous  American  civil  engi- 
neer, Mr.  Whistler  was  taken  to  Rus- 
sia at  the  age  of  eight,  but  brought 
back  to  America  four  years  later  and 
educated  at  West  Point.  At  about  the 
age  of  twenty-two  he  was  studying  under 
Gleyre  in  Paris,  and  a  few  years  later 
began  to  send  his  pictures  to  the  Salon. 
They  were  steadily  rejected  for  several 
years,  until,  in  1 863,  the  famous  "  Salon 
des  Refuses  "  welcomed  his  work  and 
hung  a  picture  of  his,  called  "  The 
White  Girl."  This  was  his  first  oppor- 
tunity to  show  to  the  public  in  Paris 
the  quality  of  his  genius,  and  his  work 
not  only  made  a  sensation,  but  marked 
him  as  one  of  the  most  original  artists 
of  the  day.  He  had  now  gone  to 
London,  and  settled  there,  and  in  the 
succeeding  years  produced  many  nota- 
ble  works,  among  them  "  La  Princesse 
46 


des  Pays  de  la  Porcelaine,"  exhibited 
at  the  Salon  ;  the  "  Symphony  in  White, 
No.  3";  "  The  Pacific,"  called  "  An  Ar- 
rangement in  Gray  and  Green  "  ;  "  The 
Blue  Wave  "  ;  "  The  Balcony,"  which 
he  called  "  A  Harmony  in  Flesh-color 
and  Green " ;  and  "  Old  Battersea 
Bridge."  He  also  painted  many  por- 
traits, among  them  the  famous  portrait 
of  his  mother  and  a  portrait  of  Thomas 
Carlyle.  Both  of  these  were  called 
"  Arrangements  in  Black  and  Gray." 
They  were  first  shown  in  London 
(1874),  and  then,  some  ten  years  later, 
at  the  Salon  in  Paris  (1883  and 
1884). 


47 


IX. 


robistlcr'3  theory 

of  art,  as  cxemplt- 

fied  in  bis 

"  arrangements," 

"harmonies"  and 

"nocturnes." 


T  will  be  observed  that  Mr. 
Whistler  is  fond  of  applying 
musical  terms  to  his  pictures, 
calling  them  "symphonies," 
"  harmonies,"  "arrangements."  A  por- 
trait by  him  is  always  an  "  arrange- 
ment,"—  perhaps  an  arrangement  in 
gray  and  yellow,  or  in  brown,  or  in 
flesh- color  and  red,  in  brown  and  black, 
or  in  black  alone,  like  his  portraits  of 
Henry  Irving  as  Philip  of  Spain,  and 
of  Senor  Sarasate.  He  has  also  named 
many  of  his  pictures  "nocturnes"  and 
others  "notes." 

So  far  from  being  mere  fanciful  ap- 
pellations these  titles  furnish  the  key  to 
Mr.  Whistler's  theory  of  art.  Rightly 
to  understand  this  theory,  it  is  neces- 
sary to  consider  the  analogy  between 
painting  and  music.  Both  are  sensu- 
ous arts,  the  one  appealing  to  our  sense 
of  beauty,  either  of  form,  of  light  and 
48 


shade  or  of  color;  the  other,  to  our 
sense  of  beauty,  either  of  tone-quality, 
of  melody  or  of  harmony.  But  paint- 
ing is  also,  and,  indeed,  as  generally 
practiced  is,  preeminently  an  articulate 
art ;  that  is,  it  has  the  power  to  tell  a 
story  clearly,  to  convey  a  definite  con- 
ception to  the  imagination,  and  thereby 
to  awaken  in  the  spectator  the  same 
emotion  that  the  artist  himself  has  ex- 
perienced. Now,  the  means  whereby  a 
painter  is  enabled  to  tell  a  story  are  the 
elements  of  form,  and  of  light  and 
shade.  He  may  tell  a  story  with  form 
alone,  and  express  the  beauty  of  the 
various  shapes  contained  in  his  compo- 
sition; if  he  add  light  and  shade,  his 
picture  gains  in  power  and  definition. 
The  element  of  color,  however,  is 
needed  to  make  the  fullest  appeal  to 
the  emotions,  for  the  aesthetic  pleasure 
excited  by  color  is  greater  than  that  im- 
parted by  form.  If,  on  the  other  hand, 
the  painter  confines  himself  to  the  use 
of  color  alone,  he  may,  indeed,  create 

49 


a  thing  of  beauty,  but  it  will  have 
a  purely  sensuous,  inarticulate  beauty, 
conveying  no  definite  thought  or  senti- 
ment or  emotion,  and  in  no  sense  tell- 
ing a  story.  Now,  a  painting  without 
suggested  form  of  some  kind  is  like  a 
piece  of  pure  music ;  for  music,  until 
wedded  to  poetry,  is  a  wholly  inarticu- 
late art,  though  it  may  stir  the  emotions 
more  powerfully  than  any  arrangement, 
however  beautiful,  of  color  without 
form.  What  form  and  light  and  shade 
are  to  painting,  namely,  the  story-telling 
or  literary  elements,  that  is  what  poetry 
is  to  music.  Notice,  now,  how  musical 
art  is  divided  into  different  departments. 
There  are  musical  compositions  with  no 
literary  element  whatever,  like  sonatas, 
symphonies,  nocturnes,  etc. ;  and  there 
are  musical  compositions  with  a  very 
definite  Hterary  elem.ent,  telling  a  definite 
story  and  exciting  a  definite  emotion,  like 
songs,  operas  and  music  dramas.  Thus 
music,  which  is  primarily  a  purely  sen- 
suous,  inarticulate   art,  may  be   made 

so 


articulate  by  joining  it  with  poetry; 
while  painting,  which  is  clearly  an  articu- 
late art,  may  be  made  almost  entirely 
sensuous  by  omitting,  so  far  as  possible, 
the  articulate  element  of  form. 

Now,  in  Mr.  Whistler's  works  the 
charm  is  preeminently  a  sensuous  one. 
There  is  no  attempt  to  tell  a  story,  no 
desire  to  express  a  sentiment.  In  his 
paintings  the  color-interest  is  para- 
mount to  everything  else.  He  wishes 
them  to  hold  a  place  in  pictorial  art 
similai*  to  that  of  symphonies,  caprices 
and.  nocturnes  in  musical  art,  to  please 
by  virtue  of  their  sensuous  beauty  and 
not  because  of  any  literary  meaning. 
Even  in  his  etchings,  which  have  been 
universally  admired,  and  pronounced 
by  the  most  competent  judges  to  be  as 
perfect  as  anything  of  the  kind  ever 
done  even  by  the  great  Rembrandt,  the 
charm  is  rather  in  the  exquisi"tely  deli- 
cate effect  of  light  and  atmosphere,  the 
spiritual  loveliness  of  the  scenes,  and 
the  mysterious  simplicity  with  which 
51 


they  are  executed.  In  his  paintings,  he 
dehghts  in  producing  the  most  delicate 
visions  of  color  often  with  the  smallest 
possible  substratum  of  form,  as  in  his 
nocturnes  and  notes ;  and  in  his  por- 
traits, into  which  the  element  of  form 
must  necessarily  enter,  he  is  not  con- 
tent with  a  mere  surface  representation 
of  the  subject,  but  paints  the  man  as 
well  as  his  features,  and  makes  of  the 
whole  a  beautiful  arrangement  of  form 
and  color  in  luminous  air. 

It  is  because  that  portion  of  the 
public,  and  especially  of  the  English 
public,  which  takes  an  interest  in  pic- 
tures, has  failed  to  grasp  this  conception 
of  art  that  it  has  also  failed  to  under- 
stand Mr.  Whistler's  beautiful  "  har- 
monies "  and  "  nocturnes,"  and  pro- 
nounced them  ridiculous  and  their  au- 
thor eccentric.  They  expect  a  picture 
to  tell  them  a  story,  and  Mr.  Whistler 
will  not  play  the  role  of  minstrel  or 
troubadour,  much  less  preach  a  sermon 
or  illustrate  a  fable.  He  wishes  his 
52 


paintings  to  be  appreciated  as  paintings 
merely,  and  those  who  lack  the  culture 
or  the  technical  training  necessary  to 
comprehend  his  finer  and  subtler  art 
have  remained  insensible  to  the  charm 
of  its  exquisite  beauties. 

Mr.  Whistler  himself  has  said : 
"  Art  should  be  independent  of  all  clap- 
trap—  should  stand  alone,  and  appeal 
to  the  artistic  sense  of  eye  or  ear,  with- 
out confounding  this  with  emotions 
entirely  foreign  to  it,  as  devotion,  pity, 
love,  patriotism,  and  the  like.  All 
these  have  no  kind  of  concern  with 
it,  and  that  is  why  I  insist  on  call- 
ing my  works  *  arrangements '  and 
*  harmonies.'  " 

That  Mr.  Whistler  is  correct  when 
he  asserts  that  painting  should  never 
seek  to  awaken  any  definite  emotion, 
in  other  words,  should  never  have  a 
literary  interest,  may  well  be  doubted ; 
but  that  he  is  thoroughly  justified  in 
confining  his  own  efforts  to  the  produc- 
tion of  works  of  purely  sensuous  beauty, 

53 


there  can,  I  think,  be  no  doubt  what- 
ever. To  sneer  at  him,  or  call  him 
eccentric,  because  he  adheres  to  this 
conception  of  art  would  be  like  quarrel- 
ing with  a  musician  who  composed  only- 
sonatas,  symphonies  and  the  like, 
instead  of  oratorios  and  operas.  Con- 
noisseurs, artists,  and  unprejudiced 
critics  have  begun  to  discern  that  Mr. 
Whistler  has  worked  in  a  department 
of  the  painter's  art  hitherto  undeveloped 
among  the  artists  of  Europe  and 
America.  If  he  owes  some  of  his 
inspiration  to  the  Japanese,  and  has 
chosen  for  his  subjects  the  same  phases 
of  Nature  that  so  long  have  fascinated 
them,  he  has,  nevertheless,  produced  in 
his  many  nocturnes  a  series  of  works 
absolutely  original  and  unlike  anything 
that  has  ever  been  done  before.  Mr. 
Whistler  is,  above  all  others,  the  inter- 
preter of  the  tender,  illusive  beauty  of 
the  night.  Before  his  time  attempts 
to  paint  night  effects  were  usually  ugly 
and  meaningless.  Burne-Jones,  indeed, 
54 


declared  one  of  Mr.  Whistler's  most 
beautiful  efforts  to  be  simply  another 
failure  to  paint  night;  but  Mr.  Jones, 
if  he  were  still  alive,  would  probably 
not  dare  to  utter  such  a  statement  now. 
Mr.  Whistler's  art  has  educated  the 
younger  generation  to  a  new  perception 
of  beauty.  In  his  wonderful  nocturnes 
he  has  fixed  on  canvas  the  blue  trans- 
parent darkness  of  the  night  as  it 
envelops  the  city  and  is  reflected  in  the 
gas-lit  river  —  the  darkness  through 
which  you  descry  the  dim  forms  of  tall 
bridges  and  phantom  boats,  of  illusive 
spires  and  dream-like  palaces.  Some- 
times he  depicts  the  strange  pallor  of  a 
summer  night,  when  the  sky  is  only 
just  obscured  by  a  passing  veil  of  dark- 
ness ;  sometimes  the  mysterious  gloom 
of  a  night  at  sea,  with  foaming  waves, 
dim  lights,  distant  ships  and  a  vague 
sense  of  the  infinite ;  and  sometimes 
his  picture  is  mere  luminous  darkness 
in  delicate  gradation  —  purple  sky 
above,  purple  below,  a  shadow  in  the 
55 


middle  of  the  picture  —  a  little  less  and 
there  would  be  nothing. 

His  celebrated  "  Nocturne  in  Blue 
and  Silver,"  representing  a  fragment  of 
old  Battersea  Bridge  in  London,  is  one 
of  the  pictures  which  Mr.  Ruskin 
characterized  as  works  "  in  which  the 
ill-educated  conceit  of  the  artist  ap- 
proached the  aspect  of  willful  impos- 
ture " — a  most  intemperate  criticism  to 
have  come  even  from  the  extravagant 
and  self-contradicting  Ruskin.  Here, 
as  everywhere,  Mr.  Whistler  has  shown 
that  refinement  of  conception,  that  ex- 
quisite sensitiveness  to  all  that  is  beau- 
tiful in  nature,  that  delicate,  subtle  han- 
dling of  light  and  color  that  distinguishes 
his  work  from  the  grossness  and  ma- 
teriality of  so  many  other  painters. 
Against  the  cold,  deep-blue  sky  looms 
up  one  pier  and  a  part  of  the  arch  of 
the  bridge  —  somewhat  in  the  shape  of 
the  letter  T  —  while  beyond  it  the  sky 
is  spangled  with  the  multitudinous 
silver  sparks  of  a  shower  of  falling  fire- 
56 


works.  Passing  beneath  the  bridge,  a 
mysterious  barge,  guided  by  a  phantom- 
like figure,  moves  along  on  the  bosom 
of  the  luminous  river;  while  on  the 
shore  are  seen  the  lights  of  the  watch- 
ing city,  and  then  the  purple  illusive 
distance.  The  highest  notes  in  this 
low-toned  picture  are  but  delicate  atten- 
uations of  light,  fading  into  that  which 
is  no  longer  light,  producing  the  subtle, 
almost  unearthly,  charm  which  is  pe- 
culiarly characteristic  of  Mr.  Whistler's 
work,  and  especially  of  his  nocturnes. 

In  his  "  Arrangement  in  Black  and 
Gold,"  which  he  explains  as  a  view  in 
Cremorne  Gardens  with  the  fireworks,  he 
has  drawn  with  miraculous  skill  a  shower 
of  falling  fire  whirling  through  a  black 
sky ;  while  in  another  nocturne,  rising 
and  falling  rockets  are  so  skillfully  drawn 
that  the  sparks  of  the  ascending  and 
descending  showers  of  fire  really  seem 
to  be  in  motion. 


57 


X. 


aib(8tler  as  a 
portraCt-patnter. 


LTHOUGH  it  is  his  noc- 
turnes that*  distinguish  Mr. 
Whistler  as  the  great  artist 
of  the  nineteenth  century, 
he  is  also  preeminent  in  his  day  and 
generation  as  a  portrait-painter.  If  not 
quite  the  equal  in  all  respects  of  the 
great  Spaniard  Velasquez,  he  often  excels 
him  in  artistic  perception  and  beauty  of 
design.  Unlike  Velasquez,  who  some- 
times copied  his  model  with  brutal  frank- 
ness, Mr.  Whistler  always  chooses  with 
the  nicest  discrimination  those  character- 
istics which  will  best  serve  his  artistic  in- 
tention. In  the  portrait  of  his  mother, 
which  is  now  in  the  Luxembourg  in 
Paris,  he  has  achieved  a  triumph  in  the 
handling  of  low  tones,  in  the  decorative 
composition  of  his  picture,  and  in  the 
fidelity  with  which  he  has  revealed  the 
very  soul  of  his  model.  It  will  be  re- 
membered that  he  calls  it "  An  Arrange- 
58 


ment  in  Black  and  Gray,"  and  in  the 
rich  deep  black  of  the  mother's  gown 
and  of  the  curtain  that  drops  past  the 
engraving  on  the  wall,  he  has  discov- 
ered possibilities  and  beauties  in  the 
handling  of  that  color  never  before 
brought  out  by  any  other  artist.  There 
is  also  an  extraordinary  beauty  in  the 
management  of  the  palpitating  grays  in 
the  background,  in  the  golden  gray 
light  that  illumines  the  sober  gravity  of 
the  portrait,  and  in  the  transition  from 
gray  to  the  highest  notes  in  the  compo- 
sition as  seen  in  the  white  cap,  the  lace 
cuffs,  and  the  small  white  handkerchief. 
Mr.  Whistler  says  he  meant  this  merely 
as  a  decorative  arrangement  of  color, 
and  he  has  certainly  achieved  a  marvel- 
ous decorative  design  in  the  arabesques 
on  the  curtain  and  in  the  exquisite  grace 
with  which  he  has  balanced  the  dark, 
rich  tone  of  the  curtain  on  the  left  by 
the  black  of  the  dress  on  the  right.  It 
cannot  be  denied,  however,  that  while 
painting  this  portrait  the  artist  must 
59 


have  been  v/holly  absorbed  in  his  model. 
In  the  marvelous  tenderness  with  which 
he  has  treated  the  delicate  hands  lying 
half  hid  in  the  little  lace  handkerchief, 
and  in  the  subtle  outline  of  the  grave, 
thoughtful  face,  he  has  told  the  story 
of  the  beautiful  old  age  of  a  Puritan 
lady ;  and  although  he  thought  the  pub- 
lic ought  not  to  know  or  care  anything 
about  the  identity  of  the  portrait,  we 
feel  that  here  his  interest  in  his  model 
has  caused  him  to  reveal  his  own  soul 
more  fully  than  anywhere  else,  and 
that  here  he  has  produced  his  greatest 
work  in  portraiture. 

In  his  portrait  of  Miss  Rose  Corder, 
the  chromatic  scheme  is  an  arrangement 
in  black  and  brown.  The  life-size 
figure  of  a  young  woman  stands  on  a 
brownish-gray  floor  against  a  back- 
ground of  airy  obscurity,  into  which  the 
outlines  of  her  form  seem  here  and 
there  to  melt  and  lose  themselves  with- 
out becoming  altogether  indistinct. 
Her  gown  is  black,  her  jacket  black, 
60 


trimmed  with  black  fur  and  lined  with 
white,  and  in  her  gloved  right  hand  she 
holds  a  brown  felt  hat  with  a  long 
feather.  Her  blond  hair  is  rolled 
tightly  on  the  top  of  her  head.  Only 
the  profile  of  her  face  is  seen,  but 
it  wears  a  calm  and  rather  lofty  expres- 
sion, and  is  suffused  with  the  rosy 
vibration  of  life.  The  portrait  is  an 
exquisite  color-harmony  in  subdued 
tones,  and  the  life-likeness  of  the 
figure,  enveloped  as  it  is  by  an  atmos- 
phere that  seems  black  without  being 
black,  gives  it  a  charm  almost  unearthly 
and  spectral.  So  perfect  a  piece  of 
painting  is  this  that  not  the  slightest 
trace  of  effort  appears,  no  hint  of  the 
method  by  which  it  was  accomplished. 
It  reminds  one  of  Mr.  Whistler's  own 
sententious  statement :  "  The  work  of 
the  master  reeks  not  of  the  sweat  of  the 
brow  —  suggests  no  effort  —  and  is 
finished  from  its  beginning."  This 
picture  indeed  would  seem  to  have  been 
created  by  an  inspiration,  and  to  have 

6i 


sprung  full-grown  and  perfect  from  the 
artist's  mind. 

Mr.  Whistler's  portraits  are  almost 
all  painted  in  subdued  colors.  Some 
have  thought  that  he  paints  flesh 
lower  in  tone  than  it  is  in  nature,  but 
he  has  met  this  criticism  squarely  by 
explaining  that  the  common  fault  of  the 
portrait-painter  is  the  foolish  attempt 
to  make  his  man  "  stand  out "  from  the 
frame,  when,  "  on  the  contrary,  he 
should  really,  and  in  truth  absolutely 
does,  stand  within  the  frame,  and  at  a 
depth  behind  it  equal  to  the  distance  at 
which  the  painter  see  his  model. " 
"  The  frame,"  he  says,  "  is  the  window 
through  which  the  painter  looks  at  his 
model,  and  nothing  could  be  more  offen- 
sively inartistic  than  his  brutal  attempt 
to  thrust  the  model  on  the  hither  side 
of  this  window !  '* 

It  was  a  fortunate  day  for  English 

art   when    Mr.  Whistler    took   up  his 

residence  in  London  and  determined  to 

remain  there  in  spite  of  the  storm  of 

62 


criticism  and  ridicule  by  which  he  was 
at  first  assailed.  The  influence  of 
Ruskin  and  others  had  led  English 
artists  into  a  pernicious  habit  of  copy- 
ing Nature  with  a  most  inconsequent 
fidelity.  Mr.  Whistler  has  taught  them 
that  it  is  not  copying  but  judicious 
selection  that  is  needed  in  art.  His 
method  is  more  learned  than  that  of 
any  of  his  contemporaries,  and  is  exert- 
ing a  wholesome  influence  on  the  artists 
of  to-day  who  are  wise  enough  to  study 
him  as  their  master. 


63 


XI. 


Sargent:  bis 

fortunate  career 

^ 

and  brilliant 

achievements. 

MONG  the  younger  genera- 
tion of  American  painters 
who  are  living  abroad 
none  is  more  faifious  than 
John  S.  Sargent.  Honors  and 
fortune  came  to  him  earlier  in  life  than 
to  most  artists.  No  doubt  he  was  less 
of  an  innovator  than  Mr.  Whistler,  and, 
therefore,  more  readily  understood. 
He  is,  nevertheless,  an  artist  in  the 
noble  sense  of  the  term,  though  he  is 
still  so  young  that  it  is  impossible  to 
determine  how  he  will  be  ultimately 
classified  among  the  men  of  his  time. 
The  works  which  he  has  produced  dur- 
ing the  last  twenty  years,  however,  show 
plainly  that  he  possesses  genius  of  a  very 
high,  if  not  quite  the  highest,  order. 

Mr.  Sargent  was  born   in  Florence, 

Italy,  of  American  parents,    in    1856. 

His    mother     was     an     accomplished 

painter   in  water-colors,  and   from    his 

64 


very  infancy  Mr.  Sargent  breathed  an 
atmosphere  of  culture  and  art.  He 
was  educated  partly  in  Italy  and  partly 
in  Germany,  and  to-day  he  speaks  and 
writes  Italian,  French,  and  German  as 
well  as  English.  He  is  a  sincere  lover 
of  books  and  of  the  drama.  He  is 
possessed  also  of  a  considerable  gift  for 
music  and  performs  on  several  instru- 
ments. Unlike  most  young  Americans 
who  set  out  to  become  painters  or  sculp- 
tors, Mr.  Sa'rgent  has  lived  all  his  life  in 
the  world's  great  art  centers,  has  become 
familiar  with  the  many  interesting  and 
picturesque  aspects  of  the  life  and  cus- 
toms of  different  nations  and  races,  and 
knows  thoroughly  their  distinguishing 
traits  and  characteristics.  All  these 
facts  must  be  considered  in  studying 
Mr.  Sargent  as  an  artist,  for  they  have  all 
had  an  influence  in  molding  his  genius 
and  determining  the  quality  of  his  art. 
Before  he  had  attained  the  age  of 
eighteen  he  had  already  had  several 
years  of  art-study,  beginning  at  the 
65 


Academy  of  Fine  Arts  in  Florence. 
He  drew  cleverly  with  either  pencil  or 
charcoal,  and  worked  in  water-color  and 
in  oil.  While  he  was  still  in  his  teens 
he  spent  a  summer  with  his  mother  in 
the  Tyrol.  There  he  met  the  cele- 
brated English  artist,  Frederick  Leigh- 
ton,  who  commended  his  sketches  and 
gave  him  the  heartiest  encouragement 
to  continue  his  studies.  Not  long  after, 
his  father  took  him  to  Paris  and  placed 
him  under  the  guidance  of  the  great 
French  master,  Carolus-Duran.  His 
progres's  was  so  rapid  that  at  the  early 
age  of  twenty-two  he  received  honora- 
ble mention  at  the  Salon  in  Paris,  where 
he  exhibited  a  picture  entitled  "  En 
Route  pour  la  Peche,"  representing 
some  fisherwomen  and  children  on  the 
seacoast.  The  following  year  he  sprang 
into  fame  by  a  dashing  portrait  of  Car- 
olus-Duran, painted  in  the  master's  own 
style.  In  each  of  the  succeeding  years 
he  exhibited  portraits  and  other  pic- 
tures, both  in  oil  and  in  "water-color. 

66 


Among  these  was  a  picture  called  "  El 
Jaleo,"  which  created  a  sensation,  and 
Is  now  one  of  his  most  famous  works. 
The  subject  is  that  of  a  Spanish  girl 
dancing  to  the  music  of  a  company  of 
singers  and  time-makers,  and  illustrates 
the  artist's  remarkable  grasp  of  race 
characteristics.  In  1889  he  won  the 
grand  prize  at  the  Paris  Exposition,  and 
was  made  a  "  ChevaHer  of  the  Legion 
of  Honor." 

Mr.  Sargent  now  settled  in  London, 
and  still  further  extended  his  fame  by 
exhibiting  a  number  of  portraits  and  a 
charming  picture  called  "  Carnation, 
Lily,  Lily,  Rose,"  representing  two 
pretty  girls  in  a  flower  garden  at  twi- 
light in  the  act  of  lighting  Chinese 
lanterns  for  some  fete.  This  picture 
was  so  highly  esteemed  by  the  members 
of  the  Royal  Academy  that  it  was  pur- 
chased by  them  on  behalf  of  the  Chan- 
trey  Fund. 

Mr.  Sargent  is  never  commonplace 
and  always  interesting.  There  is  an  in- 
67 


telligence,  a  dash  and  a  brilliancy  in  his 
work  which  at  once  distinguish  it  from 
that  of  ordinary  men.  He  has  an  ex- 
tremely delicate  sensitiveness  to  all  that 
is  artistically  beautiful,  and  a  marvelous 
gift  for  finding  effects  that  are  rare  and 
novel.  His  style  was,  of  course,  formed 
by  his  first  great  teacher,  Carolus-Du- 
ran,  and,  like  him,  he  lays  on  his  color 
with  a  broad,  sure  stroke,  and  in  a  man- 
ner that  would  lead  you,  on  close  in- 
spection of  any  of  his  works,  to  say  that 
the  subject  was  merely  "  blocked  out." 
As  you  step  back,  however,  and  view 
the  work  from  the  proper  distance,  you 
find  it  exquisitely  beautiful  in  tone,  and 
richly  suggestive  and  complete.  Mr. 
Sargent  has  studied,  in  turn,  the  meth- 
ods and  the  work  of  Carolus-Duran,  of 
Edouard  Manet,  of  Vierge,  of  the  great 
Spaniard  Goya,  and  of  Claude  Monet, 
and  from  each  he  has  wrested  some- 
thing to  add  to  his  own  artistic  resources. 
Indeed,  he  has  made  himself  such  a 
master  of  the  technique  of  his  art  that 

68 


he  is  often  tempted  to  imitate  the  style 
of  other  painters,  and  sometimes  to 
undertake  daring  and  difficult  effects, 
more,  it  is  to  be  feared,  for  the  sake  of 
overcoming  the  difficulties  of  the  task 
than  of  expressing  some  particular  artis- 
tic conception.  When  he  imitates,  he 
always  adds  something  of  his  own  that 
gives  a  novelty  and  a  distinction  to  all 
he  produces.  When  his  apparent  pur- 
pose is  merely  to  accomplish  some  dif- 
ficult feat,  to  evolve  some  startling  chro- 
matic scheme,  he  incurs  the  inevitable 
risk  of  producing  a  picture  which,  while 
it  may  excite  admiration  or  astonish- 
ment, still  fails  to  persuade  and  to 
satisfy.  For  when  expression  outruns 
thought  it  ceases  to  charm ;  or,  rather, 
it  is  no  longer  true  expression.  Mr. 
Sargent,  however,  has  so  rich  an  imagina- 
tion, and  is  so  full  of  resources,  that 
everything  he  does  must  necessarily  be 
of  a  very  high  order  and  command  the 
respect,  if  not  always  the  unqualified 
praise,  of  the  most  critical  judges. 
69 


Mr.  Sargent's  career  has  been  a  cos- 
mopolitan one.  His  early  successes 
were  made  in  France,  and  he  has  now 
for  some  years  been  one  of  the  most 
fashionable  and  distinguished  portrait- 
painters  in  London.  Some  of  his  very 
best  portraits,  however,  were  painted  in 
the  United  States.  Among  these  are 
the  celebrated  portrait  of  Beatrice,  the 
little  daughter  of  Mr.  Goelet  of  New 
York,  and  the  portrait  of  La  Carmen- 
cita,  the  tall,  slender  danseuse,  whom  he 
has  posed  so  skillfully  with  arms 
akimbo.  This  latter  picture  was  painted 
in  New  York,  and  first  shown  publicly 
at  an  exhibition  of  the  Society  of  Ameri- 
can Artists,  of  which  Mr.  Sargent  is  a 
member.  It  was  afterwards  exhibited 
in  Paris,  where  it  created  a  sensation, 
and  was  bought  by  the  French  Govern- 
ment and  placed  in  the  famous  gallery 
of  the  Luxembourg. 

Perhaps  nothing  that  Mr.  Sargent  has 
ever  done  is  more  remarkable  than  the 
great  mural  paintings  placed  a  fe  vv  years 
70 


since  in  one  of  the  halls  of  the  Boston 
Public  Library.  These  are  allegorical 
or  symbolical  in  character,  consisting  of 
a  frieze,  a  lunette  and  a  ceiling  arch. 
The  frieze  represents  the  twelve  Jewish 
prophets.  Mr.  Sargent's  vigorous  con- 
ception of  these  grand  characters  has 
now  become  well  known  through  pho- 
tographic reproductions.  The  lunette 
represents  the  Jews  in  subjection  to  the 
Egyptians  and  Assyrians,  typified  by 
figures  of  Pharaoh  and  the  Assyrian 
king.  In  the  ceiling  arch  are  repre- 
sented the  heathen  gods  of  the  ancient 
world,  with  symbolical  interpretations 
of  ancient  creeds.  The  whole  design 
is  intricate  and  full  of  significance,  the 
execution  masterly,  both  in  drawing 
and  in  color.  It  is  such  work  as  could 
have  been  produced  only  by  an  artist 
of  exceptional  intellectual  refinement, 
and  a  strongly  creative  imagination. 

Mr.  Sargent  is  now  in  the  middle  of 
life   and  in  the  fullness  of  his  power. 
His  early  manhood  has  been  marked 
7J 


by  great  artistic  achievements ;  his 
future  gives  promise  of  still  greater 
achievements. 


72 


XII. 

M  ERIC  AN  artists  have  often  edwfntord 

1  1      J        r  ,     nXechs,  an 

been      reproached      for      not   Hmencan  intcrpre- 

confining   themselves   more  t^er  of  omntai 

.     ,  ^  •  1  .  subjects. 

Strictly  to  American  subjects. 
They  are  reminded  that  the  landscape 
of  America  is  as  beautiful  and  as  varied 
as  in  any  other  country  in  the  world ; 
that  American  history  is  rich  in  heroic 
incidents  and  intensely  dramatic  in 
character ;  that,  if  American  life  is  not 
at  all  points  so  picturesque  and  roman- 
tic as  life  in  the  old  world,  it  is  at  least 
better  understood  by  the  American,  and 
hence  more  likely  to  be  interpreted  by 
him  with  success.  These  critics,  in 
their  zealous  desire  to  hasten  the  day 
when  we  shall  have  a  distinctively 
national  art,  forget  that  the  artist  paints 
what  attracts  him  most,  and  if  he  is  to 
express  the  best  that  is  in  him,  he  must 
be  allowed  to  follow  the  bent  of  his  own 
genius. 

73 


They  seem  to  think,  too,  that  art 
to  be  strictly  characteristic  of  the  nation 
by  which  it  is  produced  must  neces- 
sarily represent  only  the  various  aspects 
of  its  political  or  social  condition,  or  the 
features  of  the  territory  which  it  occu- 
pies. But  are  not  the  intellectual  and 
the  spiritual  life  of  a  nation  to  be  inter- 
preted, too  ?  And  does  not  an  Ameri- 
can artist's  impression  of  a  foreign 
scene  or  a  foreign  incident  reveal  some- 
thing of  the  mental  life  of  the  nation  of 
which  he  is  a  part  ?  At  any  rate,  some 
of  our  most  gifted  artists  are  devoting 
their  lives  to  painting  foreign  scenes 
and  foreign  subjects. 

Edwin  Lord  Weeks  has  found  his 
field  in  Northern  Africa  and  the  Orient. 
He  is  a  landscape-  and  figure-painter, 
who  is  particularly  famous  for  his  pic- 
tures of  life  in  Cairo,  Jerusalem,  Damas- 
cus, Tangier  and  India.  He  was  born 
in  Boston  in  1 849,  and  studied  in  Paris 
at  the  Ecole  des  Beaux  Arts,  and  after- 
wards under  Leon  Bonnat  and  Gerome. 

74 


At  the  age  of  twenty-nine  he  began  to 
exhibit  at  the  Salon  and  continued  to 
do  so  for  six  years ;  his  subjects  being 
from  Tangier  and  Morocco.  The  next 
year  he  sent  to  the  Salon  a  picture 
whose  subject  was  found  in  India,  and 
which  was  entitled  a  "  Hindoo  Sanctu- 
ary at  Bombay."  In  the  two  succeeding 
years  he  exhibited  a  large  picture  called 
"  Le  Dernier  Voyage,"  a  souvenir  of 
the  Ganges,  and  "  The  Return  of  the 
Mogul  Emperor  from  the  Grand 
Mosque  of  Delhi."  Others  of  his 
famous  pictures  are  called  "  Jerusalem 
from  the  Bethany  Road,"  "  Pilgrimage 
to  the  Jordan,"  "  Scene  in  Tangier," 
"  Alhambra  Windows,"  "  Arab  Story 
Teller,"  and  "A  Moorish  Camel  Driver." 
Mr.  Weeks  is  a  skillful  draughtsman 
and  an  excellent  colorist.  He  handles 
vast  and  intricate  scenes  with  perfect 
facility  and  remarkable  effectiveness. 
No  one  has  excelled  him  in  the  unhesi- 
tating directness  with  which,  in  his 
scenes   of  Hindoo  life,  he  has  treated 

75 


the  grand  architectural  backgrounds 
with  their  multicolored  richness  and 
splendor  of  detail.  In  his  large  picture 
called  "  Le  Dernier  Voyage  "  he  has 
accomplished  a  difficult  feat  with  perfect 
success.  In  the  foreground  of  the  pic- 
ture there  is  a  small  barge  crossing  the 
sacred  Ganges  River,  and  bearing  three 
figures,  an  oarsman  near  the  bow  and 
two  Hindoo  fakirs.  Of  these,  one  is 
lying  down  at  the  point  of  death,  and 
his  comrade,  who  sits  by  his  side,  is 
taking  him  to  the  holy  city  of  Benares, 
that  he  may  there  breathe  his  last  on 
the  bank  of  the  river.  The  background 
is  occupied  by  the  picturesque  Oriental 
city  with  the  intricate  forms  of  temples, 
pagodas  and  funeral  pyres,  and  groups 
of  fakirs  and  men  of  every  class  shel- 
tering themselves  from  the  blazing  sun 
under  large  white  umbrellas ;  yet  all 
this  detail,  though  treated  with  perfect 
fidelity,  does  not  thrust  itself  forward 
nor  usurp  the  interest  that  should 
attach  to  the  figures  in  the  fore- 
.76 


ground.  The  composition  shows  Mr. 
Weeks's  power  to  handle  a  dramatic 
Oriental  scene,  and  give  it  the  charm 
of  its  Oriental  color  and  atmos- 
phere. 


77 


XIII. 


Hn  Hmcrfcati 
patntcr  of  French 
peasants. 


HARLES  Sprague  Pearce 
has  also  been  attracted  by  for- 
eign subjects,  but  of  a  very 
different  kind  from  those 
selected  by  Mr.  Weeks.  He  has 
painted  portraits  and  figure  subjects,  but 
has  made  his  greatest  success  picturing 
the  rustic  landscape  and  the  peasants  of 
northern  France.  Mr.  Pearce  was  born 
in  Boston  in  1851.  He  studied  under 
Leon  Bonnat  in  Paris,  and  at  the  age  of 
twenty-five  exhibited  a  portrait  at  the 
Salon.  During  the  next  few  succeeding 
years  he  sent  figure  subjects  to  the 
Salon,  all  painted  more  or  less  in  the 
style  of  Bonnat.  He  had  not  yet 
fully  developed  his  own  individuality ; 
but  when  he  turned  his  attention  to 
rustic  subjects,  he  displayed  all  the  tech- 
nical skill,  close  observation  and  simple 
handling  characteristic  of  the  modern 
French  school,  but  with  a  touch  of  sen- 
7« 


timent  dominating  the  general  realism. 
He  is  perhaps  seen  ^t  his  best  in  a  pic- 
ture exhibited  at  the  Salon  and  called 
"  Une  Bergere/*  which  is  a  souvenir  of 
Picardy.  The  scene  Is  a  gently-sloping 
hill,  with  an  irregular  path  climbing 
between  stubble  fields  to  the  distant 
horizon.  A  flock  of  sheep  is  scattered 
about  and  browsing,  while  in  the  fore- 
ground stands  a  young  shepherdess  with 
both  hands  resting  on  her  staffs  The 
figure  is  painted  with  great  skill  and  not 
without  a  touch  of  pathos  in  the  atti- 
tude and  in  the  rather  weary,  listless 
expression  of  the  face.  The  picture,  as 
a  whole,  is  pervaded  by  a  feeling  of 
space  and  open  air  and  a  gray,  palpitat- 
ing atmosphere.  If  Mr.  Pearce  has 
not  found  a  new  field  in  which  to 
work,  he  is  at  least  thoroughly  success- 
ful in  painting  what  attracts  him  most, 
and  is  making  valuable  additions  to 
American  art.  His  pictures  have  been 
awarded  prizes  and  medals  at  exhibi- 
tions   held   in    Paris,   Berlin,   Munich, 

79 


Ghent,  Boston,  Philadelphia,  Atlanta 
and  San  Francisco.  He  has  also  been 
made  a  member  of  many  art  societies  at 
home  and  aboard. 


80 


XIV. 

RiDGWAY  Knight  is  another  che  idealism  ©f 
American  artist  who  loves  r^i^*" 
to  paint  French  peasants. 
His  art-training  began  in 
Philadelphia,  but  was  continued  in 
Paris  under  Gleyre,  and  later  under 
the  great  Meissonier  at  Poissy.  In  his 
interpretation  of  French  peasant  life  he 
is  disposed  to  select  and  give  emphasis 
to  the  bright  and  cheerful  characteristics 
and  seeks  to  charm  the  spectator  rather 
than  to  sadden  him,  like  Millet,  by  por- 
traying only  the  hard  lot  of  country 
folk  who  toil  on  in  a  manner  utterly 
cheerless  and  resigned.     Mr.  Knight  is  , 

an  idealist,  attracted  only  by  what  is 
beautiful  and  amiable  in  his  subjects. 
One  of  his  pictures,  called  "  L'Appel 
au  Passeur,"  exhibited  at  the  Salon, 
represents  two  buxom  peasant  women 
on  the  banks  of  the  Seine  calling  with 
voice  and  gesture  to  the  ferryman  on 

8i 


the  opposite  side.  Both  are  carrying 
empty  baskets  and  appear  to  be*  return- 
ing from  the  market,  whither  they  had 
gone  to  sell  the  products  of  the  farm. 
They  have  a  cheerful,  prosperous  air, 
and  suggest  the  healthfulness  and  whole- 
someness  of  country  life  rather  than  its 
weary  monotony  and  endless  toil.  The 
open-air  effect  of  the  picture  is  excel- 
lent, and  imparts  a  feeling  of  the  full- 
ness and  joyfulness  of  a  perfect  summer 
day. 


82 


XV. 

NLIKE  Mr.  Knight,  J.  Gari  HtiHiwrccan 

-  ,  1  A  •      painter  of  Dutch 

Melchers,  another  Amen-  subjects, 
can  artist  who  spends  most 
of  his  time  abroad,  dehghts 
in  ugliness  and  reahsm,  painting  by  pref- 
erence Dutch  subjects  and  selecting  for 
his  models  the  homely  and  careworn 
faces  and  figures  of  Dutch  peasants  and 
sailors. 

Mr.  Melchers  was  born  in  Detroit, 
Mich.,  and  received  his  artistic  training 
under  Boulanger  and  Lefebvre  in  Paris. 
In  1886  he  received  honorable  men- 
tion at  the  Salon,  where  he  exhibited  a 
large  painting  called  "  Le  Preche."  Two 
years  later  he  exhibited  at  the  Salon  a 
picture  of  "  Dutch  Pilots,"  seated  about 
a  table  in  an  inn,  comfortably  smoking 
and  carving  models  of  boats.  At  the* 
Universal  Exhibition  of  1889  he  was 
represented  by  both  these  works,  and  a 
very  large  painting  called  the  "  Com- 
83 


munion,"  representing  the  interior  of  a 
Dutch  church,  with  a  score  of  life-size 
and  very  ugly  figures. 

Mr.  Melchers  has  the  modern  French 
painter's  way  of  looking  at  Nature,  and 
interprets  his  subjects  with  all  the  mod- 
ern French  painter's  technical  skill.  It 
may  even  be  doubted  whether  any 
French  artist  paints  figures  with  greater 
realism  than  he.  We  may  wish,  indeed, 
that  since  he  carries  his  work  to  the 
point  of  almost  complete  illusion,  he 
would  paint  faces  and  forms  that  were 
beautiful  and  interesting  in  themselves, 
rather  than  the  dull,  parchment-like 
features  of  aged  and  ignorant  peasants. 
It  must  nevertheless  be  said  that  all  his 
pictures  are  rich  in  local  color ;  that  he 
gives  character  and  significance  to  the 
pose  and  grouping  of  his  figures  ;  that 
there  is  a  masterly  directness  and  cer- 
*  tainty  in  his  drawing;  a  simplicity  and 
strength  in  his  painting,  and  always  a 
perfect  observance  of  the  relative  values 
throughout  the  composition. 
84 


Mr.  Melchers  has  the  courage  to 
be  independent  and  individual.  His 
artistic  conceptions  are  never  common- 
place, while  his  knowledge  and  his  tech- 
nique are  at  every  point  adequate  to  the 
perfect  carrying  out  of  all  he  conceives. 
He  holds  to-day  a  distinguished  place 
among  the  painters  on  both  sides  of  the 
Atlantic.  His  work  has  won  medals 
and  prizes  in  Amsterdam,  Munich, 
Paris,  Berlin,  Antwerp  and  Philadelphia, 
and  he  has  been  made  a  member  of  many 
of  the  principal  art  societies  in  Europe 
and  America.  H  e  has  also  the  special  dis- 
tinction of  being  represented,  like  Whist- 
ler and  Sargent,  in  the  Luxembourg  in 
Paris. 


85 


OliUtam  jvf.  Chase, 
the  master 
tecbntcist. 


MM 


XVI. 

HERE  are  painters,  as  there 
are  poets  and  musicians, 
whose  chief  excellence  lies  in 
a  perfect  mastery  of  the  tech- 
nique of  their  art.  They  are  men  who 
interest  us  less  by  what  they  say  than  by 
their  manner  of  saying  it.  The  pleas- 
ure derived  from  their  work,  though  it 
is  of  a  different  kind,  need,  however,  be 
no  less  genuine  than  that  excited  by  the 
deep  thought  or  strong  emotion  of 
more  imaginative  artists.  There  are 
poets  who,  though  possessed  of  no  re- 
markable creative  power,  yet  have  an 
extraordinary  charm  because  of  their 
exquisite  diction,  the  music  of  their 
verse,  and  the  perfect  adaptation  of  form 
to  thought  and  sentiment;  and  this 
charm  is  not  only  felt  by  lovers  of 
poetry  in  general,  but  acknowledged  by 
brother  poets  and  fair-minded  critics. 
Much  the  same  is  true  of  musical  com- 

86 


posers  and  executants.  All  the  arts 
admit  of  many  styles  of  expression,  and 
each  style  is  good  in  itself  if  rightly 
understood.  Variety,  indeed,  is  one  of 
the  principal  sources  of  pleasure  in 
every  art,  and  whoever  withholds  his 
sympathy  from  all  but  a  few  favorite 
forms  of  art  expression  and  refuses  to 
learn  to  recognize  what  is  good  in 
others,  simply  narrows  his  artistic  judg- 
ment and  limits  the  range  of  his  aesthetic 
enjoyment. 

Among  our  American  painters,  Wil- 
liam M.  Chase  holds  the  place  of  the 
consummate  technicist.  In  him  the 
executive  talent  is  far  more  prominent 
than  the  creative.  It  is  his  special  forte 
to  interpret  by  means  of  pigments  the 
external  aspects  of  Nature,  to  render  the 
effects  of  light  and  color  and  texture. 
He  cares  little  for  imaginative  or  sym- 
bolical subjects.  He  is  not  a  dreamer 
who  endeavors  to  fix  on  canvas  the 
fantastic  creations  of  his  brain.  His 
art  is  almost  wholly  objective.  What- 
87 


ever  catches  the  light  or  presents  an 
interesting  note  of  color  possesses  for 
him  a  charm  which  he  renders  always 
with  unerring  skill.  He  delights  in 
still-life  subjects  as  much  as  in  figures 
or  landscapes,  and  paints  a  group  of 
vegetables  or  an  old  brass  kettle  or 
Monday's  wash  hung  out  in  the  sun  to 
dry  with  as  much  enjoyment  as  the  face 
of  a  beautiful  woman  or  the  cloud- 
shadows  chasing  each  other  across  a 
sunny  field.  He  has  never  found  it 
possible  to  limit  himself  to  a  specialty, 
like  the  artists  who  paint  only  cattle  or 
sheep  or  summer  woods.  It  is  his  boast 
that  he  can  paint  as  well  when  the  mer- 
cury is  down  to  zero,  as  in  the  month 
of  June  or  August.  He  is  not  depend- 
ent upon  any  particular  time  or  place 
for  his  inspiration.  There  are  interest- 
ing effects  of  light  around  us  at  almost 
all  times  if  we  have  but  the  eyes  to  see 
them,  and,  like  Chase,  the  skill  to  fix 
them  on  paper  or  canvas.  And  with 
the  power  to  render  adequately  all  that 


he  sees,  Chase  is  never  at  a  loss  for 
material.  He  cares  little  for  subject  or 
composition,  as  those  words  are  under- 
stood by  artists.  Like  Whistler,  he 
rather  disdains  the  story-telling  ele- 
ment in  a  picture,  and  seeks  first  of  all 
to  present  the  sensuous  beauty  of  what 
attracts  his  eye.  In  a  word,  he  is 
distinctively  a  painter y  delighting  in. 
the  tools  of  his  art,  and  handling  his 
medium  of  expression  with  masterly 
skill. 

Mr.  Chase  was  born  in  Franklin 
County,,  Indiana,  in  1849.  ^^  ^^s 
twentieth  year  he  determined  to  become 
an  artist,  and  went  to  New  York,  where 
for  two  years  he  studied  in  the  schools 
of  the  National  Academy  and  in  the 
studio  of  J.  O.  Eaton.  He  then  re- 
moved to  St.  Louis^  and  there  practiced 
his  art,  painting  still-life  subjects  and 
some  portraits.  His  work  sold  readily, 
and  he  prospered  so  well  that  in  another 
year  he  was  able  to  secure  enough  com- 
missions to  warrant  his  going  to  Europe 


for  further  study.  At  the  age  of  twenty- 
three,  therefore,  he  entered  the  Academy 
in  Munich,  and,  with  characteristic 
earnestness,  began  again  at  the  very 
foundation,  working  himself  up  from 
the  antique  class.  During  the  next  six 
years  he  not  only  absorbed  all  that  his 
teacher,  the  celebrated  Piloty,  had  to 
impart,  but  he  constantly  studied  the 
Dutch  and  Flemish  masterpieces  pre- 
served in  the  Munich  galleries.  Under 
these  influences  he  could  not  fail  to  be- 
come a  good  technicist.  The  great  aim 
in  the  Munich  studios  is  to  acquire  a 
free  and  vigorous  handling  of  the  brush, 
and  the  paintings  in  the  public  galleries 
are  for  the  most  part  the  works  of  men 
like  Rubens,  Hals,  and  Rembrandt, 
who  were  all  supreme  technicists.  Dur- 
ing this  time,  Mr.  Chase  painted  such 
pictures  as  "  The  Court  Jester,"  "  The 
Turkish  Page,"  "  Ready  for  the  Ride," 
and  "  The  Dowager,"  all  of  them  excel- 
lent examples  of  his  early  style  as  influ- 
enced by  his  Munich  training. 
90 


His  later  style  shows  that  he  has 
gained  much  from  other  sources.  He 
has  never  ceased  to  study  the  work  of 
the  world's  great  masters.  He  has 
visited  all  the  most  important  galleries 
in  Europe,  has  copied  the  pictures  in 
the  museums  in  Venice,  studied  Velas- 
quez in  Madrid,  and  visited,  year  after 
year,  the  Salon  in  Paris.  He  has 
learned  much  from  the  modern  French 
artists,  and  his  style  is  now  more  French 
than  Bavarian ;  so  that,  while  his  early 
work  was  all  painted  in  sombre  tones 
approaching  blackness,  his  later  work  is 
generally  in  a  high  key  and  always  full 
of  light  and  color. 

Mr.  Chase's  versatility  is  seen  both  in 
the  variety  of  subjects  he  handles  and 
in  the  diflferent  media  in  which  he 
works.  He  paints  still-life,  genre,  por- 
traits, and  landscapes  with  equal  skill 
and  with  equal  delight ;  and  whether  it 
be  oil,  water-color,  gouache,  or  pastel 
that  he  employs,  whether  a  canvas  six 
by  ten  inches  or  a  canvas  six  by  ten 
91 


feet,  whether  the  surface  be  smooth  as 
ivory  or  rough  as  coffee  sacking,  he 
always  shows  that  each  has  its  own 
special  advantages  and  that  something 
can  be  done  with  each  that  cannot  be 
done  so  well  with  any  of  the  others. 

One  of  Mr.  Chase's  special  delights 
is  to  paint  a  picture  placed  within  a 
picture.  Many  of  his  own  landscapes 
and  figure  pictures  reappear  as  adorning 
the  wall  of  an  "  interior  with  figures  " 
forming  the  subject  of  another  picture. 
In  these  the  painted  gold  of  the  frame 
of  the  pictured  picture  is  brought  close 
to  the  real  gold  of  the  frame  of  the 
actual  picture.  The  artist's  representa- 
tion of  gold  is  thus  made  at  once  to 
challenge  comparison  with  the  real  gold, 
and  any  shortcomings  on  the  part  of 
the  artist  would  be  strikingly  apparent. 
In  one  of  these  compositions  he  has 
painted  his  own  wife  as  seated  before 
one  of  his  own  landscapes,  but  in  the 
attitude  of  having  just  turned  her  eyes 
from  the  picture  to  reply  to  a  remark 
92 


made  by  some  one  behind  her.  Here 
Mr.  Chase  has  not  only  overcome  the 
technical  difficulty  of  painting  the  gold 
frame  with  sufficient  skill  to  stand  com- 
parison with  the  real  frame  but  he  has 
also  kept  a  definite  sense  of  distance 
between  the  figure  in  the  foreground 
and  the  picture  in  the  background. 
There  is,  also,  in  the  figure  a  suggested 
action  combined  with  a  feeling  of  re- 
pose ;  while  the  face  and  the  attitude  tell 
plainly  the  simple  story  of  the  picture. 
It  has  been  objected  by  some  intel- 
ligent critics  that  such  pictures  as  this 
are  mere  devices  of  the  artist  to  show 
his  cleverness  ;  that,  instead  of  express- 
ing some  sentiment  or  emotion  to  the 
observer,  they  simply  fill  him  with  a 
consciousness  of  the  painter's  technique. 
I  have  already  hinted,  however,  that 
Mr.  Chase  has  his  limitations.  Who- 
ever wishes  to  enjoy  his  work  must  not 
seek  in  it  what  he  does  not  pretend  to 
give ;  but  accepting  the  artist  as  he  is, 
and  understanding  his  aim,  one  will  find 

93 


in  Mr.  Chase,  as  one  of  his  brother 
artists  says, "  A  master  painter,  who  does 
well  all  that  he  tries  to  do,  and  some 
things  as  well  as  any  man  living." 


94 


XVII. 

HEN  we  come  to  study  John  7obn  i,a  f arge, 

the  Hmci 
colorist. 


La  b  ARGE,  who  is  par  excel- 


lence the  American  colorist, 
we  find  a  striking  contrast 
to  Mr.  Chase.  Mr.  La  Farge  does 
not,  like  Mr.  Chase,  see  merely  the 
surface  beauty  of  things,  he  has  the 
finer  insight  that  enables  him  to  per- 
ceive the  more  hidden  beauty  of  their 
spiritual  significance.  He  is  preemi- 
nently a  creative  artist,  in  the  presence 
of  whose  glowing  color  harmonies  the 
feelings  are  stirred  and  exalted,  the 
sordid  and  the  commonplace  being  for- 
gotten in  the  contemplation  of  celestial 
beauty. 

Mr.  La  Farge  was  born  in  New  York 
in  1835.  The  environment  in  which 
he  lived  from  his  earliest  youth  was 
fortunately  such  as  to  foster  and  develop 
to  the  utmost  the  strong  sense  of  color 
with  which  Nature  had  endowed  him. 
95 


His  boyhood  was  spent  in  "Newport, 
R.  I.,  where  he  stored  his  visual 
memory  with  vivid  impressions  of  the 
rich  beauty  of  the  landscape  and  the 
ever-changing  aspect  of  the  sky  and 
the  sea.  With  flowers  he  formed  an 
intimate  and  loving  companionship,  and 
from  them  he  learned  the  secret  of  deli- 
cate gradation  and  harmony  of  color. 
At  the  age  of  twenty-one  he  went 
to  Paris  and  entered  the  studio  of 
Couture.  After  a  few  weeks*  time,  his 
master  recognized  in  him  a  young  man  of 
original  genius  and  advised  him  to  free 
himself  from  all  studio  influences  and 
study  alone  by  himself  La  Farge  re- 
turned to  America.  Here  he  formed  a 
life-long  friendship  with  William  M. 
Hunt,  who  was,  perhaps,  the  most 
original  and  spiritual  artistic  genius  this 
country  had  yet  produced.  The  influ- 
ence of  Hunt  was  to  deepen  and  fix  in 
La  Farge  his  already  strong  natural 
tendency  t6  seek  for  the  religious  aspect 
of  life  and  nature.  It  must  not  be 
96 


supposed,  however,  that  La  Farge  in 
any  sense  imitated  his  friend.  He  was 
too  original  and  too  independent  to  fol- 
low any  other  man,  and  belongs  to  no 
special  school  of  art.  He  is,  indeed, 
exceedingly  difficult  to  classify  as  an 
artist,  for  he  is  neither  the  disciple  of 
any  school  nor  yet  the  founder  of  one. 
Most  men  of  great  originality  and 
strong  convictions  seek  to  express  their 
theories  in  a  connected  series  of  works, 
which  are  sure  to  bear  a  striking  family 
resemblance  to  one  another,  and  which 
other  men,  admiring  the  master,  learn 
at  last  to  imitate.  The  artistic  perform- 
ances of  Mr.  La  Farge,  however,  are 
of  an  extent  and  variety  seldom  found 
in  the  works  of  any  modern  artist.  He 
is  at  once  a  painter  of  landscapes,  of 
flowers,  of  portraits,  of  genre  subjects, 
and  of  subjects  religious,  and  purely 
ideal  and  imaginative ;  he  has  worked 
in  oil,  in  water-color  and  on  wood; 
he  is  a  mural  decorator,  a  painter  in 
stained  glass,  and  a  sculptor.     In  all  of 

97 


these  forms  of  art  he  has  shown  his 
individuahty  and  power  of  thought. 
In  none  has  he  so  persistently  followed 
out  any  one  theme  as  to  make  it  easy 
for  others  to  discover  his  mode  of  think- 
ing or  to  copy  his  manner.  His  great- 
ness lies  not  so  much  in  any  startling 
innovations  that  he  has  made  in  art  as 
in  the  earnestness  and  loftiness  of  his 
purpose,  his  remarkable  creative  power, 
the  spirituality  of  his  conceptions,  his 
depth  and  sincerity  of  feeling,  and  in 
his  marvelous  richness  and  beauty  of 
color. 

Among  the  earliest  works  with  which 
Mr.  La  Farge  came  before  the  public 
were  a  number  of  notable  landscapes. 
These  are  admirable  examples  of  the 
painter's  peculiar  skill  in  the  treatment 
of  light  and  color-values  through  all 
their  subtle  gradations.  One  of  these 
is  a  view  from  a  hill  near  Paradise, 
Newport,  a  most  daring  and  difficult 
composition,  representing  land  stretch- 
ing out  into  unending  distance,  flooded 


with  a  strong  midday  light.  Others 
are  winter  scenes,  in  which  he  has  pre- 
sented all  the  subtle  and  delicate  grada- 
tions of  the  color  of  snow  while,  at  the 
same  time,  preserving  its  apparent 
whiteness  and  purity.  Beginning  in 
the  foreground  with  a  faint  tinting  of 
pink,  he  gradates  the  color  into  green," 
putting  here  and  there  a  touch  of 
deepest  blue  in  the  depressions  of  the 
ground,  and  towards  the  edge  of  the 
horizon  a  slight  hint  of  yellow ;  yet  all 
these  he  keeps  so  carefully  subdued  as 
to  make  an  ensemble  of  almost  imper- 
ceptible color  and  to  give  the  snow  a 
look  of  interesting  reality. 

In  none  of  these  landscapes  has  he 
carried  his  work  to  a  state  of  high 
finish.  He  has  given  breadth  and  a 
sense  of  largeness  in  brush  work,  but 
no  hint  of  elaboration.  In  the  work 
of  Mr.  La  Farge  the  details  are  always 
subordinated  and  almost  disdained.  It 
is  through  color  rather  than  by  means 
of  the  drawing  that  Mr.  La  Farge  seeks 

99 


to  give  his  interpretation  of  any  aspect 
of  life  or  nature.  It  is  one  of  his 
strongest  convictions  that  color  sym- 
bolizes character  and  can  be  made  to 
express  the  hidden  meaning  of  things. 
He  has,  therefore,  reinforced  his 
naturally  quick  perception  of  color  by 
a  careful  study  of  its  scientific  use.  To 
this  he  owes  much  of  his  originality  in 
coloring,  "  the  most  striking  features  of 
which  are  his  frequent  use  of  a  crescendo 
in  his  scale  of  tones,  his  constant  habit 
of  shading  by  most  delicate  gradations, 
and  his  delight  in  sharp  juxtaposition 
of  primaries."  In  the  use  of  this 
last  device  he  was  probably  influenced 
by  the  Orientalists,  for  he  was  at  one 
time  a  close  student  of  Japanese  art  and 
its  laws  of  color. 

In  his  flower  pictures,  Mr.  La  Farge 
has  given  us  interpretations  of  the  rose, 
the  hollyhock,  the  water  lily,  the  lotus 
and  other  blossoms,  which  are  remark- 
able for  their  purity  and  charm  of 
color,  the  flowers  forming  a  theme  for 


a  most  delicate  and  refined  harmony 
that  addresses  the  eye  with  occult 
power. 

As  a  painter  of  purely  imaginative 
work,  he  has  drawn  some  oF  his  subjects 
from  the  realm  of  fairyland  and  witch- 
craft. "  The  Pied  Piper  of  Hamelin," 
"The  Wolf  Charmer,"  "The  Sor- 
ceress," "  The  Fisherman  and  the 
Genii,"  "  The  Siren's  Song,"  are  all 
works  of  the  purest  fantasy,  yet  each 
has  a  significance  of  its  own  and  reveals 
an  almost  divine  insight  into  the  nature 
of  things. 

Before  he  had  concluded  his  thirty- 
third  year,  Mr.  La  Farge's  life  had 
already  been  extraordinarily  productive. 
Besides  landscapes  and  flowers,  he  had 
made  many  drawings  on  wood  and  in 
water-color,  in  illustration  of  the 
poems  of  Browning  and  of  an  edition  of 
Tennyson's  "  Enoch  Arden,"  and  of 
the  "  Songs  of  the  Old  Dramatists." 
He  had  also  produced  numerous  por- 
traits and  studies  of  heads  and  figures, 


in  which  there  is  the  same  depth  and 
sincerity  of  feehng  as  in  the  landscapes, 
the  same  breadth  of  treatment.  His 
portraits  are  generally  painted  in  low 
tones,  but  the  tones  are  rich  and 
strong.  The  details  are  barely  sug- 
gested, all  power  being  focussed  on  the 
expression  of  character  rather  than  on 
the  features. 

At  this  period  he  had  already  pro- 
duced many  important  religious  pictures 
also.  Among  these  are  a  spirited  head 
of  "  St.  John  the  Baptist,"  and,  as 
frescoes,  pictures  of  "  The  Madonna," 
"  The  Crucifixion,"  and  "  The  Ascen- 
sion," besides  other  cathedral  paintings. 
His  highest  note  of  power  at  this  time 
was  reached  in  a  large  picture  called 
"  St.  Paul,"  painted  as  the  altarpiece  of 
a  church.'  This  is  such  a  masterpiece 
as  could  have  been  produced  only  by 
a  fervent  believer.  It  is  painted  in  the 
spirit  of  the  great  renaissance  models, 
with  all  their  breadth  and  largeness  of 
treatment,  their  union  of  strength  and 


simplicity,  but  it  in  no  wise  suggests 
imitation,  being  original  both  in  idea 
and  in  execution. 

In  this  short  discourse  we  could 
not  trace  the  full  history  of  this  won- 
derful man's  life  and  achievements.  He 
has  visited  Europe  many  times ;  has 
sketched  and  painted  in  France,  in 
Japan,  in  the  islands  of  the  Pacific,  as 
well  as  in  America.  His  growth  as  an 
artist  has  never  yet  suggested  any  limi- 
tations. He  goes  to  Nature  in  the 
spirit  of  the  investigator  and  discoverer, 
and  is  constantly  finding  new  truth  and 
beauty. 

In  1876,  he  made  the  mural  deco- 
rations for  Trinity  Church,  Boston. 
Later,  he  made  the  decorations  of  St. 
Thomas's  Church  in  New  York,  aided 
by  his  friend,  the  celebrated  American 
sculptor,  St.  Gaudens. 

During  the  last  fifteen  years  he  has 

painted  comparatively  few  easel  pictures, 

giving  almost  his  entire  time  to  mural 

decorations  and  stained-glass  painting. 

103 


His  two  most  noted  public  windows  are 
the  so-called  "  Blue  Window  "  in  Trini- 
ty Church,  Boston,  and  the  Harvard 
Memorial,  or  "  Battle  Window."  In 
the  magnificent  residence  of  the  late 
Cornelius  Vanderbilt  there  are  decora- 
tions by  La  Farge  said  to  form  as 
original  and  beautiful  an  ensemble  as 
perhaps  has  been  executed  since  the 
Renaissance.  The  stained  glass  used 
in  the  windows  are  from  Mr.  La  Farge's 
own  designs  and  factory. 

In  turning  to  glass  as  a  medium  of 
expression,  Mr.  La  Farge  was  attracted 
by  the  unequaled  opportunities  it 
offered  to  a  colorist.  Actuated  always 
by  the  highest  art  ideals,  and  looking  to 
the  betterment  of  his  fellow  men,  Mr. 
La  Farge  believes  that  the  standard  of 
public  taste  in  this  country  can  be  more 
quickly  raised  to  a  higher  level  by 
means  of  beautiful  designs  in  colored 
glass  windows,  placed  in  the  large 
churches  and  other  buildings  through- 
out the  country,  than  by  any  other  form 
104 


of  art.  In  State  buildings  and  in  pri- 
vate mansions  he  has  free  play  for  the 
exercise  of  his  pictorial  and  poetical 
fancy,  while  church  windows  offer  a 
field  for  the  religious  subjects  to  which 
his  own  taste  most  strongly  inclines 
him.  Glass  also  offers  to  the  colorist 
an  opportunity  for  endless  experiments 
in  combinations,  and  Mr.  La  Farge  was 
tempted  by  the  hope  of  making  some 
new  discoveries  of  lasting  worth  and 
beauty.  The  splendid  color-mosaics 
that  he  has  produced  display  the  same 
originality  that  distinguishes  his  earlier 
efforts  with  "pigments,  and  to-day  no 
other  living  artist  has  so  perfect  a  com- 
mand and  comprehension  of  this  brittle 
vehicle  of  opalescent  glory. 


XVIII. 


Cbe  Great  HmcH- 
can  genre  painter, 
CClinsloTc  Bonier. 


MONG  our  representative 
American  painters  we  have 
not  only  a  great,  probably  the 
greatest,  living  interpreter, 
of  pure  sensuous  beauty  in  Whistler,  a 
great  landscapist  in  Inness,  a  great  tech- 
nicist  in  Chase,  and  a  great  colorist  in 
La  Farge,  we  have  also  a  great  genre 
painter  in  Winslow  Homer,  who  is 
the  most  truly  national  of  all  our 
painters,  and  one  of  the  few  men  living 
in  the  world  to-day  who  can  be  called 
great  artists.  A  profound  original 
genius  and  wholly  devoted  to  his  art. 
Homer  lives  the  life  of  a  recluse  in  a 
lonely  spot  on  the  coast  of  Maine,  his 
only  companions  being  the  rude  toilers 
on  land  and  sea,  hunters,  farmers, 
fishermen  and  sailors.  It  is  the  lives  of 
these  humble  people  that  Homer  inter- 
prets ;  and  his  works  all  testify  to  his 
power  of  close  observation,  his  firm 
1 06 


grasp  upon  essential  points  of  character, 
and  his  thoroughly  individual  manner 
of  handling  his  subject.  Indeed,  his 
work  never  betrays  the  influence  of  any 
school  of  art  or  the  method  of  any 
other  artist. 

Born  in  Boston,  February  24,  1836, 
Homer  began  to  develop  his  gift  for 
art  in  early  childhood,  obtained  employ- 
ment at  the  age  of  nineteen  in  a  litho- 
graphing establishment  in  Boston,  where 
he  remained  for  two  years,  and  at  the 
age  of  twenty-three  began  to  study  at 
the  National  Academy  of  Design  in 
New  York,  and  under  F.  Rondel.  Some 
eight  years  later  he  made  a  short  trip  to 
Europe,  but  it  was  after  he  had  already 
fully  developed  his  own  method  of 
painting.  The  style  that  he  instinct- 
ively formed  in  his  youth  he  has  not 
since  altered,  never  having  been  swayed 
or  affected  by  any  passing  fad  or 
fashion. 

During  the  Civil  War,  Homer  paint- 
ed, from  personal  observation,  many 
107 


stirrmg  scenes  of  the  camps,  the  marches 
and  the  battlefields,  and  one  of  these, 
called  "  Prisoners  from  the  Front,"  has 
long  been  celebrated  as  a  unique  work 
in  American  art.  He  has  also  given  us 
faithful  interpretations  of  the  pictur- 
esque episodes  of  the  negro  life  in  those 
days ;  has  portrayed  the  rough  exist- 
ence of  the  American  frontiersman,  the 
rude  exploits  of  the  brave  woodsman 
and  hunter ;  he  has  told  on  canvas  many 
stories  of  the  hard,  and  often  heroic, 
lives  of  American  fishermen  and  sailors  ; 
and  he  has  painted  sympathetically  and 
appreciatively  many  phases  in  the  life 
of  the  farmer,  so  full  of  toil  and  strug- 
gle. He  has  depicted  the  peaceful 
scenes  of  American  village  life  and  of 
the  country  school.  In  short,  whatever 
is  idyllic  or  heroic  in  the  lives  of  the 
common  people  of  this  great  democ- 
racy, Homer  has  closely  observed  and 
painted  as  he  has  seen  it,  never  soften- 
ing a  line  or  modifying  a  feature  for  the 
sake  of  producing  a  pleasing  effect,  but 

icS 


always  telling  the  essential  truth  of  his 
subject  in  a  style  at  once  broad  and 
masterful,  sincere  and  noble. 


log 


MiHne,  anttnal, 
figure,  and  land- 
scape painters. 


XIX. 

N  this  essay  we  can  speak  of 
only  a  very  few  of  the  note- 
worthy American  artists. 
We  must  not  fail  to  observe, 
however,  that  we  have  also  many  excel- 
lent marine  painters,  chief  of  whom  is 
Alexander  Harrison,  famous  for  the 
splendor  and  mystery  of  his  pictures  of 
surf  and  sea  by  moonlight.  The  key- 
note of  Mr.  Harrison's  art  is  truth  to 
Nature.  No  other  living  painter  knows 
so  well  as  he  how  to  reproduce  the  in- 
stantaneous phases  of  cloud  and  sky, 
the  subtle  lines  of  the  curling  wave,  and 
the  appearance  of  the  wash  sliding  over 
the  smooth  sand  with  a  mirror-like 
surface  that  reflects  the  sky.  Others  of 
our  distinguished  marine  painters  are 
W.  T.  Richards,  Edward  Moran,  and 
M.  F.  H.  De  Haas.  Among  animal 
painters,  if  we  have  none  of  front  rank, 
we   have,   at   least,   men   like    George 


Inness,  Jr.,  Peter  Moran,  Carleton  Wig- 
gins, and  C.  Morgan  Mcllhenny.  In 
Edwin  A.  Abbey  we  have  one  of  the 
foiir  greatest  draughtsmen  of  the  nine- 
teenth century,  though  we  must  admit 
that  he  has  not  as  yet  become  a  first- 
rate  colorist.  F.  D.  Millet  and  Henry 
M osier  are  both  accomplished  story- 
tellers on  canvas,  and  M  osier  has  the  dis- 
tinction of  being  represented  in  the  Lux- 
embourg in  Paris.  W.  T.  Dannat  and 
J.  J.  Shannon  are  famous  portrait-paint- 
ers. Elihu  Vedder  is  noted  for  the 
imaginative  and  poetic  character  of  his 
compositions ;  George  Hitchcock  for 
his  paintings  of  Dutch  subjects,  in  which 
the  color  scheme  is  largely  governed  by 
a  mass  of  flowers  —  a  gardenplot  of 
white  liHes,  or  tulips,  or  a  hedge  of  lilac 
bushes  in  full  bloom.  Among  our  best 
landscape  painters  we  need  to  mention 
D.  W.  Tryon,  in  whose  work  there  is 
a  note  of  sadness  and  touching  poetic 
sentiment ;  R.  Swain  GifFord,  who  has 
painted  the  mountain  scenery  of  Califor- 


nia,  the  plains  and  meadows  of  New 
England,  the  landscape  of  old  England, 
of  France,  Italy  and  Spain,  and  the  desert 
wastes  and  tropical  beauties  of  Africa ; 
Thomas  Moran,  famous  for  his  large 
canvases  representing  scenes  in  the 
Rocky  Mountains  and  the  Yellowstone 
Park ;  J.  Francis  Murphy,  distin- 
guished for  the  mellow,  rich  tones  of 
his  pictures  ;  Charles  Melville  Dewey, 
in  whose  moonlight  pictures  there  is 
exquisite  delicacy  of  tone  and  tender- 
ness of  feeling;  and  Charles  H.  Davis, 
who  is  one  of  the  great  landscapists  of 
the  day.  Some  of  our  distinguished 
women  painters  are  Cecilia  Beaux,  a 
portraitist  famous  on  two  continents  ; 
Rhoda  Holmes  Nicholls,  Rosina  Sher- 
wood, and  Clara  McChesney. 


XX. 

HE  history  of  American  art 
extends  over  two  centuries  ; 
but,  although  we  have  had 
distinguished  painters  since 
the  days  of  Gilbert  Stuart  and  of  Cop- 
ley, it  was  not  until  within  the  last 
thirty-five  years  that  American  artists 
have  won  the  fullest  recognition  in 
the  principal  art  centers  of  Europe. 
To-day,  many  of  the  greatest  and  most 
famous  living  painters  are  Americans, 
and  nowhere  are  they  held  in  such 
high  esteem  as  in  Europe  and  especially 
in  France.  Indeed,  the  French  to-day 
ungrudgingly  expect  the  Americans  to 
supersede  them  before  the  end  of 
another  century.  Our  native  painters 
have  proved  themselves  possessed  of 
the  highest  ambition  and  capable  of  the 
severe  application  characteristic  always 
of  true  genius.  What  may  they  not 
hope  to  accomplish  when  there  shall  at 
"3 


last  have  been  made  for  them  in  their 
own  country  an  artistic  milieu,  such  as 
they  are  now  obliged  to  seek  in 
Europe?  When  in  this  work-a-day 
country  of  ours  we  have  come  at  last  to 
accept  the  dictum  of  Emerson,  that 
"  one  ray  of  beauty  outvalues  all  the 
utilities  in  the  world,"  then,  perhaps,  our 
American  life  will  be  no  longer 
"  uninteresting,"  and  Matthew  Arnold's 
arraignment  of  our  civilization  no 
longer  true. 


THE  END. 


"4 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


A    000  910  617    0 


ll  1 

III 

\u 

